“But it’s not the same to me or to us, not at all the same, Bram. My delinquencies, real or imaginary, cannot be allowed to come between my father and the best clerk he ever had, the man who is to make up for my business shortcomings. So--so if you please, Elshaw, I’ll take my chance of the strangling, though, mind you, I should have thought you might have discovered some more refined mode of making away with me, something just as effective, and--and nicer to look at.” His voice was tremulous, and he did not look at Bram, though he succeeded pretty well in maintaining a light tone. Bram laughed shortly. “My refinement’s only skin deep, you see, Mr. Christian. I told you so. The raw Sheffielder’s very near the top. And in these fine clothes, too!” He glanced down rather scornfully at the brand-new overcoat, and at the glazed expanse of unaccustomed shirt-front which showed underneath. There was another pause. Both the young men were trembling violently, and found it pretty hard to keep up talk at this placid level of commonplace. Quite suddenly Chris said--“Well, good-night, Elshaw,” and started on his way back to Holme Park at a good pace. Bram drew a long breath. He had just gone through an experience so hideous, so horrible, that he felt as if he had been seared, branded with a hot iron. For the first time he realized now what he had been simple enough not to suspect before, that Christian had never for a moment seriously entertained the idea of marrying Claire. And yet he was in love with her! Bram, loving Claire himself, was clear-sighted and not to be deceived on this point. Christian loved her still enough to be jealous of any other man’s feelings for her. He had betrayed this fact in every word, in every tone. If, then, he loved her and did not mean to marry her, he, the irresistible, the spoilt child of the sex, what right had he to love her, to make her love him? What motive had he in passing so much of his time at Duke’s Farm? And there darted into poor Bram’s heart a jealous, mad fear that was like a poison in his blood. He clenched his teeth, he shook his fists in the air; again the wild, fierce passion which had swept over him at Christian’s stabbing words seized him and possessed him. He turned quickly, as if to start in pursuit of Chris, when a low sound, a cry, stopped him, turned him as if into stone. For, at a little distance from him, between where he stood and the retreating figure half-way down the hill, stood Claire. An exclamation escaped his lips. She ran panting towards him. CHAPTER XII. A MODEL FATHER. Dark as the night was, the moon being so thickly obscured by clouds that she never showed her face except through a flying film of vapor, Claire seemed to detect something alarming in Bram’s attitude, something which caused her to pause as she was running up the hill towards him. At last she stopped altogether, and they stood looking each at the figure of the other, motionless, and without speaking.