Alexander Lauderdale Junior was very much exercised in spirit concerning the welfare of his two daughters, of whom the elder was Charlotte and the younger was Katharine. Charlotte had been married, nearly two years before the opening of this tale, to Benjamin Slayback, the well-known member of Congress from Nevada, and lived in Washington. Katharine was still at home, living with her father and mother and grandfather, in the old house in Clinton Place, in the city of New York.

Mr. Lauderdale, the son of the still living philanthropist, and the nephew of the latter’s younger brother, the great millionaire, Robert Lauderdale, sat in his carefully swept, garnished and polished office on a Saturday morning early in April. In outward appearance, as well as in inward sympathy, he was in perfect harmony with his surroundings. He resembled a magnificent piece of mechanism exhibited in a splendid show-case—a spare man, extremely well proportioned, with a severe cast of face, hard grey eyes, and a look all over him which recalled a well-kept locomotive. He sat facing the bright light which fell through the clear plate glass. One of his hands, cool, smooth, lean, lay perfectly still, spread out upon the broad sheet of a type-written letter on the table; the other, equally motionless, hung idly over his knee. They were grasping hands, with long, curved nails, naturally highly polished. It was not probable that the great Trust Company, in which Alexander Junior held such an important position, should ever lose the fraction of a fractional interest through any oversight of his.

So far as his own fortune was concerned, he often said that he was poor. He lived in an old house which had been his grandfather’s and father’s in turn, but which, although his father was alive and continued to live in it, had become his own property some years previous to the beginning of this story. For Alexander Lauderdale Senior was a philanthropist; and although his brother, the rich Robert, gave liberally toward the support of the institutions in which he was interested, Alexander had little by little turned everything he possessed into money, applying it chiefly to the education of idiots. The consequence was that he depended, almost unconsciously, upon his only son for the actual necessities of life. The old house was situated on the north side of Clinton Place, which had never been a fashionable street, though it lay in what had once been a most fashionable neighbourhood. No one need be surprised if the near relatives of such a very rich man as Robert Lauderdale lived very quietly, so far as expenditure was concerned. He was a very generous man, and would have done much more for his nephew and the latter’s family if he had believed that they wished or expected it. But in his sensible view, they had all they needed,—a good house, a sufficient amount of luxury, and a very prominent position in society. He knew, moreover, that, however much he might give, the money would either find its way into the vast charities in which his brother was interested, or would disappear, as other sums and bits of property had disappeared before now, to some place—presumably one of safety—of which his nephew never spoke. For he suspected that Alexander Junior was not nearly so poor as he represented himself to be, and he was not exactly pleased with the fact that he himself was the only person before whom Alexander Junior bowed down and offered incense.

For this younger Lauderdale was a very rigid man in almost all respects: in his religion, which took the Presbyterian form, and took it in earnest; in his uprightness, which was cruelly sincere; and in his outward manner, which was in the highest degree conventionally correct.

It was this extreme correctness which lay at the root of his present troubles, since, in his opinion, both his daughters had departed from it in opposite directions and in an almost equal degree. He did not recognize himself in either of them, and, as he believed his own character to be an excellent model for his family, his vanity was wounded by nature’s perverseness. Furthermore, he distinctly disliked that sort of social prominence which is the portion of those who are not like the majority, or who do not think with the majority and say so. Both Mrs. Slayback and Miss Lauderdale attracted attention in that way.

Mrs. Slayback was handsome and vain, and believed herself to be proud in the better sense of the word. She had married her husband for two reasons: because she found the paternal home intolerable, and because, besides being rich, Benjamin Slayback was thought to be a man who had a brilliant future before him in the world of politics. Charlotte had believed that she could rule him, and herself become a power. In this she had been disappointed at the outset, having been deceived by a certain almost childlike simplicity of exterior, which was in reality one of Slayback’s strongest weapons. He admired her very much; he looked up to her with admiration for her superior social acquirements, and he treated her with a sort of barbaric liberality to which she had not been accustomed. But within himself he followed his own political devices without consulting her, and with a smiling reticence which convinced her most unpleasantly that she was not intellectually a match for him. This was all the more painful as she considered him to be her social inferior, a point of view which was popular with some of her intimate friends in New York, but much less so in Washington, and not at all in Nevada.

The immediate consequence of this state of affairs was that Charlotte and her husband did not agree. Both were disappointed, though in an unequal measure. Slayback claimed that any woman should be contented who had what he gave his wife. Charlotte thought that she showed great forbearance in not leaving a man whom she could not rule. It was not worth while, she said to herself, to have accepted a man who had, at her first acquaintance with him, worn a green tie; whose speech at home was remarkable rather for its ‘burr’ than for its grammar, and who did queer things with his knife and fork—unless his undeniable intelligence and force were to be at her service in such a way as to make her feel that she was at least as powerful a person as he. She had condemned the green tie, and he had submitted, and she had successfully conveyed hints against cutting fish and potatoes with a steel knife; but in the matter of grammar she had been less successful. When Benjamin was on his legs on the floor of the House, as he often was, he could speak very well indeed, which made it all the more unpleasant when he relapsed into the use of dialect, not to say slang, at his own table. He was a jovial man over his dinner, too, and she particularly detested jovial men, especially when they spoke English not altogether correctly. She had vaguely hoped that Benjamin would be spoken of as Mrs. Slayback’s husband, but it had turned out that, in spite of her beauty and brilliant conversation, she was spoken of as Benjamin Slayback’s wife. By way of outshining him, she had conceived the plan of outshining everybody else in matters of fashion and fashionable eccentricity. She had spoken to more than one member of the family of obtaining a divorce on the ground of incompatibility of temper, which, she said, could be managed in Nevada, since New York was so absurdly strict about divorces. It was evidently within the bounds of the possible that she might have spoken in this sense to friends who were not related to her, as her father knew. Altogether, he was aware that she was talked of and he suspected that she was laughed at. She had been seen to smoke cigarettes, it was reported that she had driven four-in-hand, and Alexander would have been less surprised than shocked if he had heard that she played poker with her intimates and bet on horse-races.

It was hard that such a man should have such a daughter, he thought, and that all this should be the result of so much careful and highly correct training and education. It was harder still that his younger child should be as completely out of sympathy with him as her elder sister, especially as Katharine outwardly resembled him, at least a little, whereas Charlotte had inherited her fair complexion from her mother.

Of the two, Katharine was the more difficult to deal with, and he was glad that her peculiarities were mental rather than outwardly manifested in her behaviour, as her sister’s were. But of their kind, they were strong and caused him great anxiety. There was a mystery about her thoughts, too, which he could not fathom, and which influenced her conduct, as though she had some secret motive for some of her actions and for many of her opinions, which might, perhaps, have explained both, but which she was not willing to divulge. Katharine held views upon religion which were of the most disquieting character, and Katharine flatly refused to speak of being married. These were Alexander Junior’s principal grievances against her.

So far as the second of these was concerned, he might have found plenty of excuse for her, had he sought it, in his own character. Whatever his faults might be, he had been a very faithful man. He had married Emma Camperdown, the famous beauty from Kentucky, when they had both been very young, and he had loved her all his life, in spite of the fact that she was a Roman Catholic and he a very puritanically inclined Presbyterian of the older school. Love that will bear the strain of religious differences, when religious conviction exists on both sides, must be of a very robust nature, and Alexander’s had borne it for a quarter of a century. It was true that his wife, who had been born a Catholic, was not aggressively devout; but in his view of the matter, her errors were mortal ones, and the thought of her probable fate in a future existence had really saddened the hard man’s life. But it had not diminished nor shaken his love. About that, there was nothing romantic, nor Quixotic, nor emotional. It had none of the fine, outward qualities which often belong abundantly to transient passions. There was in it a good deal of the sense of property, which was very clearly defined with him, and he lacked in most ways the delicacies and tendernesses which are the rarest and most beautiful ornaments of the strong. But such as it was, its endurance and good faith were unquestionable. Indeed, endurance and uprightness were Alexander’s principal virtues. Both were genuine, and both were so remarkable as to raise him high in the respect of his fellow-men. If he had secrets, he had a right to keep them, for they concerned nobody but himself, and he was naturally reticent.

Katharine had some similar qualities. She had loved her distant cousin, John Ralston, a long time, and she was as faithful and enduring as her father. Ralston loved her quite as dearly and truly, but Alexander Junior would not have him for a son-in-law, and had told him so in an exceedingly plain and forcible manner. His objection was that Ralston seemed unable to do anything for himself, and had, moreover, acquired a reputation for being fast and dissipated. He was not rich, either. His father, Admiral Ralston, had been dead several years, and John lived with his mother on twelve thousand a year. The young man had made two attempts at steady work and was now making his third, the previous ones having resulted in his leaving the lawyer’s office in which he had placed himself, at the end of three months, and the great banking establishment of Beman Brothers, in Broad Street, after a trial of only six weeks. He had now gone back to Beman’s, having been readmitted as an especial favour to Mr. Robert Lauderdale, with no salary and with an unlimited period of probation before him. He was a popular young fellow enough, but he was not what is called a promising youth, though his ways had improved considerably during the last few months. Mr. Beman said that he came regularly to the bank and seemed disposed to work, but that his ignorance of business was something phenomenal. Nevertheless, to please old Robert the Rich, John Ralston was tolerated, so long as he behaved himself properly.

And Katharine loved him, in spite of her father’s disapproval and her mother’s good advice. For during the preceding winter Mrs. Lauderdale, who had once favoured the match, had gone over to the enemy, and showed a very great and almost unbecoming anxiety to see Katharine married. Hamilton Bright, another distant relative and the junior partner of Beman Brothers, would have married her at any moment, and he was a very desirable man. The fact that he was a relative was in his favour, too, for both he and Katharine would probably in the end inherit a share of the enormous Lauderdale fortune, and it would be as well that the money should not go out of the family. Robert Lauderdale had never married, and was now well over seventy years of age, though his strength had not as yet come to labour and sorrow.

Katharine did not talk of John Ralston. Especially of late, she avoided saying anything about him. But she would look at no one else, though she had no lack of suitors besides Hamilton Bright, and in spite of her reticence it was easy to see that her feelings towards Ralston had not undergone any change. Once, during the preceding winter, Alexander had been visited by a ray of hope. Ralston had been reported by the newspapers as having got into a bad scrape, winding up with an encounter with a pugilist, and ending in his being brought home by policemen in the middle of the night. It had actually been said that he had been the worse for too much champagne, and during a few hours Mr. Lauderdale had hoped that Katharine would be disgusted and would give him up. But it turned out to have been all a mistake. No less a personage than the celebrated Doctor Routh had at once written to the papers, stating that he had attended John Ralston when he had been brought home, that he had met with an accident, and that the current statements about his condition were utterly false and libellous. And there the matter had ended. Alexander might congratulate himself upon having got the alliance of his wife against John, but their united efforts to move their daughter had proved as fruitless as his own had been when unassisted.

There was nothing for it but to wait patiently, and to hope that she might forget her cousin in the course of time. Meanwhile, another anxiety presented itself, almost as serious, in her father’s opinion. She had been brought up as a Presbyterian, like her sister, in accordance with his wishes, and in this respect Mrs. Lauderdale had been conscientious, though her antagonism to her husband’s church was deep-seated and abiding. But of late Katharine had begun to express very dangerous and subversive opinions in regard to things in general and in respect of religion in particular. Her mind seemed to have reached its growth and to have entered upon its development. Katharine was going astray after strange new doctrines, Alexander thought, and he did not like the savour of mysticism in the fragments of her conversation which he occasionally overheard. Though he could not with equanimity bear to hear any one deny the existence of the soul, he disliked almost more to hear it spoken of as though humanity could have anything to do with it directly, beyond believing in its presence and future destiny. Whether this was due to the form of the traditions in which he had been brought up, or was the result of his own exceedingly vague beliefs in regard to the soul’s nature, it is of no use to enquire. The fact was the same in its consequences. He was very much disturbed about Katharine’s views, as he called them, and at the same time he was conscious for the first time in his life that no confidence existed between her and him, and that their spheres of thought on all subjects were separated by a blank and impenetrable wall.

Then, too, Katharine had of late shown a strong predilection for the society of Paul Griggs, a man of letters and of considerable reputation, who was said to have strange views upon many subjects, who had lived in many countries, and who had about him something half mysterious, which offended the commonplace respectability of Alexander Lauderdale’s character. Not that Alexander thought himself commonplace, and as for his respectability, it was of the solid kind which the world calls social position, and which such people themselves secretly look upon as the proud inheritance of an ancient and honourable family. Everything that Paul Griggs said jarred unpleasantly on Alexander Lauderdale’s single but sensitive string, which was his conservatism.

Griggs disclaimed ever having had anything to do with modern Buddhism, for instance. But he had somehow got the reputation of being what people call a Buddhist when they know nothing of Buddha. As a matter of fact, he happened to be a Roman Catholic. But Mr. Lauderdale had heard him use expressions which had fixed the popular impression in his mind. The conversation of such a man could not be good for an impressionable girl like Katharine, he thought. He took it for granted that Katharine was impressionable because she was a girl and young. Mr. Griggs said very paradoxical things sometimes, and Katharine quoted them afterwards. Mr. Lauderdale hated paradox as he hated everything which was in direct opposition to generally received opinion. It was most disagreeable to him to hear that there was no such thing as a future, as distinguished from past or present, when so much of his private meditation had for its object the definition of the future state for himself and others. He did not like Mr. Griggs’ way of referring to the popular idea of the Supreme Being as a ‘magnified, non-natural man’—and when Griggs quoted Dante’s opinion in the matter, Alexander Lauderdale set down Dante Alighieri as an insignificant agnostic, which was unjust, and branded Mr. Griggs as another, which was an exaggeration. Now, whatever the truth might be, he considered that Katharine was in great danger, and that although Providence was necessarily just, it might have shown more kindness and discretion in selecting the olive branches it had vouchsafed to him.

It need hardly be said that of the two extremes to which his daughters seemed inclined to go, he preferred the one chosen by Katharine. That, at least, gave no open offence. Morally, it was worse to dissect the traditional soul as it had been handed down in its accepted form through many generations of religious men, than to smoke a cigarette after a dinner party. But in practice, the effect of the cigarette upon the opinion of society was out of all proportion greater, and Charlotte was therefore worse than Katharine, as a daughter, though she might not be so bad when looked upon as a subject for potential salvation.

All this disturbed Alexander Lauderdale very much, for he saw no immediate prospect of any improvement in the condition of things. For once in his life his daughters were almost his chief preoccupation. If he had been subject to absence of mind, something might, perhaps, have got out of order in the minute details of the Trust Company’s working. In that respect, however, he was superior to circumstances. But when he was momentarily idle, his mind reverted to its accustomed channels, and the problem regarding the future of his daughters got into the way and upset his financial calculations, and made him really unhappy. For his financial calculations were apparently of a nature which made them pleasant to contemplate, although he declared himself to be so very poor.

On that particular Saturday morning he was interrupted in his solitude by the sudden appearance of his wife. It was not often that she had entered his office during the ten years since he had been installed in it, and he was so much surprised by her coming that he positively started, and half rose out of his chair.

Mrs. Lauderdale was a beautiful woman still, and would be beautiful if she lived to extreme old age. But she was already past the period up to which a woman may hope to preserve the freshness of a late youth. The certainty that her beauty was waning had come over her very suddenly on a winter’s evening not long ago, when she had noticed that the man who was talking to her looked persistently at Katharine instead of at herself; and just then, catching sight of her face in a mirror, and being tired at the time, she had realized that she was no longer supreme. It had been a bitter moment, and had left a wound never to be healed. The perfect, classic features, the beautiful blue eyes, the fair waving hair, were all present still. Her tall figure was upright and active, and she had no tendency to grow stout or heavy. She had many reasons for congratulating herself, but the magic halo was gone, and she knew it. Some women never find it out until they are really old, and they suffer less.

At the present moment, as she entered her husband’s office, it would have been hard to believe that Mrs. Lauderdale could be more than five and thirty years of age. The dark coat she wore showed her figure well, and her thin veil separated and hid away the imperfections of what had once been perfect. She was a little agitated, too, and the colour was in her cheeks—a trifle too much of it, perhaps, but softened to the delicacy of a peach blossom by the dark gauze.

She paused a moment as she closed the door behind her, glancing first at her husband, and then looking about the unfamiliar room, to satisfy herself that they were alone.

“This is an unexpected pleasure, Emma,” said Alexander Junior, rising definitely and coming to meet her.

“Yes,” answered Mrs. Lauderdale. “I don’t often come, do I? I know you don’t like to be disturbed. But as this is Saturday, and I knew you would be coming up town early, I thought you wouldn’t mind. It’s rather important.”

“I trust nothing bad has happened,” observed Alexander, drawing up a chair for her.

“Bad? Well—I don’t know. Yes—of course it is! It’s serious, at all events. Uncle Robert’s dying. I thought you ought to know—”

“Dying? Uncle Robert?”

Alexander Lauderdale’s metallic voice rang through the room, and his smooth, lean hands grasped the arms of his chair.

An instant later he looked a little nervously at the door, as though hoping that no one had heard his words, nor the tone in which he had spoken them. A dark flush rose in his face and the veins at his temple swelled suddenly, while his grip on the chair seemed to tighten, and he turned his eyes on his wife.

“Dying!” he repeated in a low voice. “What has happened to him? When did you hear of this?”

Mrs. Lauderdale had not expected him to show so much feeling. She, herself, was far from calm, however, and did not notice his extreme agitation as though it were anything unnatural.

“Doctor Routh came to tell me,” she answered. “He’s been there all the morning—and as there was time before luncheon, I thought I’d come—”

“But what’s the matter with the old gentleman? This is very surprising news—very sad news, Emma.”

A rather spasmodic, electric smile had momentarily appeared on Alexander Lauderdale’s face, disappearing again instantly, as he uttered the last words.

“I’m very much overcome by this news,” he added, after a short hesitation.

He did not appear to be so deeply grieved as he said that he was, but the words were appropriate, and Mrs. Lauderdale recognized the fact at once.

“It will make a great difference,” she said.

“Yes, I should say so. I should say so,” repeated Alexander Junior, not with emphasis, but slowly and thoughtfully. “However,” he continued, suddenly, “we mustn’t count—I mean—yes—we—we mustn’t altogether place our confidence in man—though Doctor Routh certainly stands at the head of his profession. It’s our duty to see that other physicians are called in consultation. We must do our utmost to help. Indeed—it might have been wiser if you had gone there at once and had sent a messenger for me, instead of coming here. But—yes—you haven’t told me what the matter is, my dear. Is it—anything in the nature of apoplexy—or the heart—you know? At his age, people rarely—but, of course, while there’s life, there’s hope. We mustn’t forget that.”

He seemed unable to wait for his wife’s answer to his questions.

“Why, no, my dear,” she replied. “You know he’s not been very well for some days. He’s worse—that’s all. It was nothing but a cold at first, but it’s turned into pneumonia.”

“Pneumonia? Dear me! At his age, people rarely live through it—however, he’s very strong, of course. Difference!” he exclaimed, softly. “Yes—a great difference. It—it will make a great gap in the family, Emma. We’re all so fond of him, and I’m deeply attached to him, for my part. As for my poor father, he will be quite overcome. I hope he has not been told yet.”

“No—I thought I’d wait and see you first.”

“Quite right, my dear—quite right—very wise. In the meantime, I think we should be going. Yes—it’s just as well that you didn’t take off your hat.”

He rose as he spoke, and touched one of the row of electric buttons on his desk. A man in the livery of the Company appeared at the door, just as Alexander was taking up his overcoat.

“I’m going up town a little earlier than usual, Donald,” he said. “Inform Mr. Arbuckle. If anything unusual should occur, send to Mr. Harrison Beman.”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s all, Donald.”

The man faced about and left the office, having stood still for several seconds, staring at Alexander. Donald had been twenty years in the Company’s service, and did not remember that Mr. Lauderdale had ever left the office before hours in all the ten years since he had been chief, nor in the preceding ten during which he had occupied more or less subordinate positions.

Mrs. Lauderdale daintily pulled down her veil and pulled up her gloves, shook out her frock a little and looked at the points of her shoes, then straightened her tall figure and stood ready. Alexander had slipped on his coat, and was smoothing his hat with a silk handkerchief which he always carried about him for that purpose. He had discovered that it made the hat last longer. Both he and his wife had unconsciously assumed that indescribable air which people put on when they are about to go to church.

“We’ll take the Third Avenue Elevated,” said Mr. Lauderdale. “It’s shorter for us.”

Robert Lauderdale’s house was close to the Park. The pair went out together into Broad Street, and the people stared at them as they threaded their way through the crowd. They were a handsome and striking couple, well contrasted, the dark man, just turning grey, and the fair woman, still as fair as ever. It might even be said that there was something imposing in their appearance. They had that look of unaffectedly conscious superiority which those who most dislike it most strenuously endeavour to imitate. Moreover, when a lady, of even passably good looks, appears down town between eleven and twelve o’clock in the morning, she is certain to be stared at. Very soon, however, the Lauderdales had left the busiest part of the multitude behind them. They walked quickly, with a preoccupied manner, exchanging a few words from time to time. Lauderdale was gradually recovering from his first surprise.

“Did Routh say that there was no hope?” he asked, as they paused at a crossing.

“No,” answered Mrs. Lauderdale. “He didn’t say that. He said that uncle Robert’s condition caused him grave anxiety. Those were his very words. You know how he speaks when a thing is serious. He said he thought that we all ought to know it.”

“Of course—of course. Very proper. We should be the first, I’m sure.”

It would not be fair, perhaps, to say that Alexander’s voice expressed disappointment. But he spoke very coldly and his lips closed mechanically, like a trap, after his words. They went on a little further. Then Mrs. Lauderdale spoke, with some hesitation.

“Alexander—I suppose you don’t know exactly—do you?” She turned and looked at his face as she walked.

“About what?” he asked, glancing at her and then looking on before him again.

“Well—you know—about the will—”

“My dear, what a very foolish question!” answered Alexander, with some emphasis. “We have often talked about it. How in the world should I know any better than any one else? Uncle Robert is a secretive man. He never told me anything.”

“Because there are the Ralstons, you know,” pursued Mrs. Lauderdale. “After all, they’re just as near as you are, in the way of relationship.”

“My father is the elder—older than uncle Robert,” said Alexander. “Katharine Ralston’s father was the youngest of the three.”

“Does that make a difference?” asked Mrs. Lauderdale.

“It ought to!” Alexander answered, energetically.