"The thing _must_ be a success," he says. "Mr. St. Vincent has explained two or three little mistakes, or miscalculations, rather, and given me his ideas. I wish I had time to take it up thoroughly. But I have to leave town for several days. Could you wait, think? I am coming again to-night. What a pity such a brain must go back to ashes! He is not an old man, either, but he has worn hard on himself. There, my time is up," glancing at his watch. Mr. St. Vincent receives Mr. Grandon with evident pleasure, but it seems as if he looks thinner and paler than yesterday. There is a feverish eagerness in his eyes, a tremulousness in his voice. The doctor is to be up presently, and Grandon is persuaded to wait. After the first rejoicing is over, Grandon will not allow him to talk business, but taking up Goethe reads to him. The tense, worn face softens. Now and then he drops into a little doze. He puts his hand out to Grandon with a grateful smile, and so the two sit until nearly noon, when the doctor comes. Floyd follows him down-stairs. "Don't ask me to reconsider my verdict," he says, in answer to the other's look. "The issues of life and death are _not_ in our hands. If you really understood his state, you would wonder that he is still alive. Keep all bad tidings from him," the doctor adds rather louder to Denise. "Tell him pleasurable things only; keep him cheerful. It cannot be for very long. And watch him well." "Where is Miss St. Vincent?" asks Grandon, with a very pardonable curiosity. "She has gone out. He will have it so. She does not dream the end is so near." And Denise wipes her old eyes. "Mr. Grandon, is it possible that dreadful man must marry her?" "Oh, I hope not!" "He is very determined. And ma'm'selle has been brought up to obey, not like your American girls. If her father asked her to go through fire, she would, for his sake. And in a convent they train girls to marry and to respect their husbands, not to dream about gay young lovers. But my poor lamb! to be given to such a man, and she so young!" "No, do not think of it," Grandon says, huskily. "You shall see her this evening, sir, if you will come. I will speak to master." Grandon goes on to the factory. Wilmarth is away, and he rambles through the place, questioning the workmen. There are some complaints. The wool is not as good as it was formerly, and the new machinery bothers. The foreman does not seem to understand it, and is quite sure it is a failure. Mr. Wilmarth has no confidence in it, he says. Then Grandon makes a thorough inspection of some old books. They certainly _did_ make money in his father's time, but expenses of late have been much larger. Why are they piling up goods in the warehouse and not trying to sell? It seems to him as if there was no real head to the business. Can it be that he must take this place and push matters through to a successful conclusion? It seems to him that he could really do better than has been done for the last six months.