disturbed Wake was that her eyes, fixed on Ernest, were full of tears. He had never seen tears in them before.
The eyes of Piers, Maurice, and even the infant, Patience, were on Finch, and Finch looked more miserable than Wakefield had ever seen anyone look in all his life. Certainly he had not fallen heir to a fortune!
"But who?" he entreated, in his penetrating treble. "Who?"
All the eyes, dark and light, intense and mournful, turned on him. Words froze on his lips. He began to cry.
"No wonder the child weeps," said Augusta, regarding him gloomily. "Even he is conscious of the outrage of it."
Nicholas took his pipe from his mouth, tapped it over the hearth, then blew it out with a whistling sound. He said nothing, but Piers broke out: "I always knew he had a yellow streak. But how he accomplished this"
"My mother," declared Augusta, "must have been demented. Let Mr. Patton say what he will"
"Old ninny," said Piers, "to allow a woman of that age to play ducks and drakes with her money! It's a case for the courts. We must never stand for it. Are you going to let yourself be done out of what is really yours, Renny?"
"Really his!" cried Augusta.
"Yes, really his! What about those other wills?"
Augusta's glazed eyes flashed away the tears. "What of the will in which all was left to your Uncle Ernest?"
Ernest suddenly seemed to feel weak. He sat down and twisted his fingers between his knees, and his underlip between his teeth.
"That was years ago!" retorted Piers.
"She was sane then. She must have been quite mad when she made this will."
Ernest held up his hand. "Don't! Don't! I can't bear to hear Mama spoken of so!"
"But, Ernest, the money should be yours!"
"I can do without the money."
Piers glared at Augusta. "I don't see why the blazes
