murder." "I'll take care of myself," said the old man, somewhat inconsistently, for certainly he was acting differently to what he said. "By the way, you have the other will?" "Yes! It leaves everything to Bernard save the legacies, which remain much the same. Of course, in the first will is mentioned an annuity to Mrs. Gilroy." "Hum, yes. I left her out of the new will. The fact is, I don't trust Mrs. Gilroy. She's too friendly with Julius for my taste." "I understood her to be on the side of Bernard." "Oh, she's on whatever side suits her," said Sir Simon, testily. "However, let the first will stand. She's a poor thing and has had a hard life. I have every right to leave her something to live on." "Why?" asked Durham, bluntly. He found Mrs. Gilroy something of a mystery, and did not know what was the bond between her and Sir Simon. "Never you mind. I have my reasons, so let things remain as they are. Bernard can marry Miss Malleson when I am dead if he chooses." "He thinks he has been disinherited?" [pg 47] "Yes! I told him so. The truth will come as a pleasant surprise." [pg 47] "Won't you take him back into favor and tell him?" urged Durham. "No! not at present. If we met, there would only be more trouble. He has a temper inherited from his Italian mother, and I have a temper also. He behaved very rudely to me, and it's just as well he should suffer a little. But I don't want him to go to the war. He must be bought out." "I fear Bernard is not the man to be bought out." "Oh, I know he is brave enough, and I suppose being bought out at the eleventh hour when war is on is not heroic. All the same, I don't want him to be shot." "You must leave things to chance," said Durham decidedly. "There is only one way in which you can make him give up his soldiering." "What's that?" "Make friends with him, and ask him to wait till you die." "No, no, no!" said Sir Simon, irritably. "He must keep away from me for a time. After all, he is the son of his father, and, bad as Walter was,
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