So effective, indeed, was his assumption of his father’s duties that I could not refrain from congratulating him, and it was during the conversation that naturally followed that he supplied me with details of the family finances. Thus I learned from him that, prior to his admission to the Home of Rest in which he was now detained, his father had been persuaded by his legal advisers to retire from the management of the Adult Gripe Water; and that the right to manufacture this, together with the existing plant, had then been sold to a limited company. As the sole proprietor, Mr. Abraham Stool had received a considerable sum of money, half of this having been paid to him in cash and the remainder in shares of the new company. The cash had then been invested, upon his solicitor’s advice, in colonial and Government securities, and a will drawn up of which Ezekiel was kind enough to give me the exact particulars. Then he paused for a moment, and it was then, leaning towards me with the utmost affection, that he uttered the words of which, as I have already recorded, I could not but recognize the good feeling. “And so you see, dear Augustus, each of my sisters will receive an equal portion of my father’s estate, and if it would be any help to you, I should be only too glad to give you one of them in marriage.” Admirably meant, however, as was this offer, and obviously one of considerable value, few could have blamed me, I think, for the instinctive shudder with which I was obliged at first to postpone an answer. Nor was he one of them. “In fact I never supposed,” he said, “that you could immediately bring yourself to accept. And I fully appreciate that, had I been in your position, my gesture of repulsion would have been equally violent. But at the same time I thought it might be useful to you to know that they would be there to fall back upon.” I stared at him. “To fall back upon?” I asked. Colouring deeply, he held out his hand. “I was speaking metaphorically,” he said. “I beg your pardon.” “Conceded,” I replied. “But it was an unpleasant idea.” “And an ill-chosen phrase,” he said. “All that I meant was that they would be there for you to select from.” “Do you mean all of them?” I asked. He signified his assent. “Subject to the Great Reaper,” he said, “I think that I can promise that.” Then for five minutes we sat in silence, and then, extending my hand to him, I rose to my feet. [Illustration: _Ezekiel Stool, drawn from a portrait once in the possession of the A.D.S.U._ ] “Ezekiel,” I said, “I am not unobliged to you, and although I could never view such a marriage with enthusiasm, yet I can conceive circumstances in which, as a last resort, it might be my duty to consider it.” “Precisely,” he said, “and it is for such a contingency that I shall be only too glad, as I have said, to reserve them.”