The day after Lord Cairnforth's coming of age Mr. Menteith formally
resigned his trust. He had managed the property so successfully during
the long minority that even he himself was surprised at the amount of
money, both capital and income, which the earl was now master of,
without restriction or reservation, and free from the control of any
human being.

"Yes, my lord," said he, when the young man seemed subdued and almost
overcome by the extent of his own wealth, "it is really all your own.
You may make ducks and drakes of it, as the saying goes, as soon as ever
you please. You are accountable for it to no one--except One," added
the good, honest, religious man, now growing an old man, and a little
gentler, grave, as well as a little more demonstrative than he had been
twenty years before.

"Except One. I know that; I hope I shall never forget it," replied the
Earl of Cairnforth.

And then they proceeded to wind up their business affairs.

"How strange it is," observed the earl, when they had nearly concluded,
"how very strange that I should be here in the world, an isolated human
being, with not a single blood relation, not a soul who has any real
claim upon me!"

"Certainly not--no claim whatsoever; and yet you are not quite
without blood relations."

Lord Cairnforth looked surprised. "I always understood that I had no
near kindred."