betrayed no hint of a regret for his own shabby part in the
affair. When it was not possible to rest the blame upon his
grandfather, he merely shrugged his shoulders and lightly tossed
the responsibility to fate.

"This is one of the things I daren't do at the house," he
remarked after a moment, inhaling a cloud of smoke and blowing it
in spirals through his nostrils; "the old man won't tolerate
anything more decent than a pipe, unless it happens to be a chew.
Oh, I'm sick to death of the whole business," he burst out
suddenly. "When I woke up this morning I had more than half a
mind to break loose and go abroad to Maria. By the way, Wyndham's
dead, you know; he died last fall just after we went away."

"Ah, is that so!" exclaimed Christopher. "She'll come home, then,
will she?"

"That's the queer part--she won't, and nobody knows why. Wyndham
turned out to be a regular scamp, of course; he treated her
abominably and all that, but he no sooner died than she turned
about and picked up one of his sisters to nurse and coddle. Oh,
it's all foolishness, but I've half a mind to run away, all the
same. A life like this will drive me crazy in six months, and
I'll be hanged if it is my fault, after all. He knew I never had
a head for books, but he drove me at them as if I were no better
than a black slave. Things have all been against me from the
start, and yet I used to think that I was born to be lucky--"

"What does he mean to do with you now?" inquired Christopher.