who laughed last. And, after a few years, there would be Sylvia—pretty, charming, enchanting Sylvia. He put the thought of her roughly away. Not because he was ashamed of it, but because it hurt him. The thought that Sylvia should wait for a dead woman’s shoes had seemed natural; what hurt him was that she herself should see nothing unnatural in such waiting.
The silence had grown to the limit that spells discomfort; the ticking of the tall clock, the rustle of the plane tree’s leaves outside the window, the discords of Fleet Street harmonised by distance, all deepened the silence and italicised it. She spoke.
“Well?” she said.
The plane tree’s leaves murmured eloquently of the great oaks in the park. The old lady’s eyes looked at him appealingly through the pale-smoked glasses. How she would like that old place! And his debts—he could pay them all.
“I will,” he said suddenly; “if you will, I will; and I pray you may never regret it.”
“I don’t think you will regret it,” she said gently; “it is a truly kind act to me.”
Bank and solicitor, duly consulted, testified to Miss Thrale’s respectability and to her
