have taken the staff out of my hand:  you have extinguished the light.  I have existed—­ay, a pensioner, unknowingly, on this dear lady’s charity; to her I say no more.  To you, sir, by all that is most sacred to a man-by the ashes of my mother! by the prospects of my boy!  I swear the annuity was in my belief a tangible token that my claims to consideration were in the highest sources acknowledged to be just.  I cannot speak!  One word to you, Mr. Beltham:  put me aside, I am nothing:—­Harry Richmond!—­his fortunes are not lost; he has a future!  I entreat you—­he is your grandson—­give him your support; go this instant to the prince—­no! you will not deny your countenance to Harry Richmond:  let him abjure my name; let me be nameless in his house.  And I promise you I shall be unheard of both in Christendom and Heathendom:  I have no heart except for my boy’s nuptials with the princess:  this one thing, to see him the husband of the fairest and noblest lady upon earth, with all the life remaining in me I pray for!  I have won it for him.  I have a moderate ability, immense devotion.  I declare to you, sir, I have lived, actually subsisted, on this hope! and I have directed my efforts incessantly, sleeplessly, to fortify it.  I die to do it!  I implore you, sir, go to the prince.  If I’ (he said this touchingly) ’if I am any further in anybody’s way, it is only as a fallen tree.’  But his inveterate fancifulness led him to add:  ‘And that may bridge a cataract.’

My grandfather had been clearing his throat two or three times.

’I ‘m ready to finish and get rid of you, Richmond.’

My father bowed.

’I am gone, sir.  I feel I am all but tongue-tied.  Think that it is Harry who petitions you to ensure his happiness.  To-day I guarantee-it.’

The old man turned an inquiring eyebrow upon me.  Janet laid her hand on him.  He dismissed the feline instinct to prolong our torture, and delivered himself briskly.

’Richmond, your last little bit of villany ’s broken in the egg.  I separate the boy from you:  he’s not your accomplice there, I’m glad to know.  You witched the lady over to pounce on her like a fowler, you threatened her father with a scandal, if he thought proper to force the trap; swore you ’d toss her to be plucked by the gossips, eh?  She’s free of you!  You got your English and your Germans here to point their bills, and stretch their necks, and hiss, if this gentleman—­and your newspapers!—­if he didn’t give up to you like a funky traveller to a highwayman.  I remember a tale of a clumsy Turpin, who shot himself when he was drawing the pistol out of his holsters to frighten the money-bag out of a market farmer.  You’ve done about the same, you Richmond; and, of all the damned poor speeches I ever heard from a convicted felon, yours is the worst—­a sheared sheep’d ha’ done it more respectably, grant the beast a tongue!  The lady is free of you, I tell you.  Harry has to thank you for that