Part 7

“You split straws!” growls Southwold. “The business of the world would never get done if men hemmed and hawed and tortured themselves as you do. _Can_ you retract your refusal? That’s the main question.”

“I can. Folliott said that they should take no action on it for twenty-four hours, but hold it in abeyance for that term. Fanshawe suggested that, indeed insisted on it.”

“Fortunate for you that a practical man was with you. I have a respect for Mr. Fanshawe which I did not feel before. Well, my dear Wilfrid, you can’t hesitate.”

Bertram does hesitate.

He looks across at the roses.

“Will you decide for me, Miss Seymour?”

“It is a great responsibility,” she replies, and her colour rises.

She plays with one of the roses nervously for a few moments. At last she looks up and says gravely:

“I think you should accept, Mr. Bertram. To you such wealth would be no sinecure, but always regarded as a great trust to be employed for the welfare of others.”

Bertram bends his head.

“Since you think so, I will endeavour to merit your opinion of me.”

“And if you go and live on the Italian lands you can be as self-sacrificing and as wretched as you like,” adds Southwold, gleefully. “Mosquitoes, malaria, malandrini, and the hourly probability of a shot from behind a hedge, or a dagger-thrust from an irate beggar, will certainly provide you with constant material for the most active altruism.”

“Of course he will be in England half the time; there is a great deal of the Errington property in England,” says Lady Southwold, before whose mental vision many charming prospects are dancing; and she rises and goes across to Cicely Seymour and kisses her on her sun-illumined hair.

“You will always give Wilfrid good counsel, won’t you darling?” she says, very tenderly.

“Mr. Bertram will want no counsel but his own conscience,” says Cicely Seymour, with the colour in her cheeks. “Oh, Lord Southwold, conscience is so rare in our days, it seems almost dead; you should not laugh at those who through all mockery try to keep alive its sacred flame!”

“Since Wilfrid has your esteem, my dear, I laugh at him no longer,” says Southwold, with pleasant malice. “I am thoroughly convinced that he is the wisest, and will be the happiest, of men.”

OUIDA.

UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON

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