“You were an only son,” she said softly.  “She must have been very fond of you.”

“Customary thing, I suppose,” he remarked.  “Lucky for her, under the circumstances, that she died young.”

He closed the oaken door in front of the picture, and locked it.

“I should like to see the armory,” he said; “but I really forget—­let me see, it is at the end of the long gallery, isn’t it?”

She led him there without a word.  She was getting a little afraid of him.  They inspected the library and wandered back into the picture gallery.  It was she, now, who was silent.  She had shown him all her favorite treasures without being able to evoke a single spark of enthusiasm.

“Once,” she remarked, “we all had a terrible fright.  We were told that everything was going to be sold.”

He nodded.

“I did think of it,” he admitted; “but there seemed to be no hurry.  All these things are growing into money year by year.  Some day I shall send everything to Christie’s.”

She looked at him in horror.

“You cannot—­oh, you cannot mean it?” she cried.

“Why not?  They are no use to me.”

“No use?” she faltered.

“Not a bit.  I don’t suppose I shall see them again for many years.  And the money—­well, one can use that.”

“But I thought—­that you were rich?” she faltered.

“So I am,” he answered, “and yet I go on making more and more, and I shall go on.  Money is the whip with which its possessor can scourge humanity.  It is with money that I deal out my—­forgive me, I forgot that I was talking aloud, and to a child,” he wound up suddenly.

She looked at him, dry-eyed, but with a strained look of sorrow strangely altering her girlish face.

“You must be very unhappy,” she said.

“Not at all,” he assured her.  “I am one of those fortunate persons who have outlived happiness and unhappiness.  I have nothing to do but live—­and pay off a few little debts.”

He rose directly afterwards, and she walked with him out to the gardens whence a short cut led to the village.

“I have not tried again to make you change your mind,” he said as they stood for a moment on the terrace.  “If my wishes have any weight with you, I trust that you will do nothing without consulting Mr. Pengarth.”

“And you—­” she faltered, “are you—­never in London?  Sha’n’t I see you again any time?”

“If you care to, by all means,” he answered.  “Tell Mr. Pengarth to let me have your address.  Goodbye!  Thank you for taking care of my treasures so well.”

She held his cold hand in hers and suddenly raised it to her lips.  Then she turned away and hurried indoors.

Wingrave stood still for a moment and gazed at his hand through the darkness as though the ghosts of dead things had flitted out from the dark laurel shrubs.  Then he laughed quietly to himself.