“He is very quiet and patient now—generally—and quite determined to make a name for himself as a composer. But he seems to me extraordinarily frail. Do you remember that lovely French poem of Sully Prudhomme’s I read you one night—‘_Le Vase Brisé_’? The vase has had a blow. No one knew of it. But the little crack widens and grows. The water ebbs away—the flowers die. ‘_Il est brisé_—_n’y touchez pas_!’ I can see it is just that Mr. Sorell feels about Otto. “What makes one anxious sometimes, is that he has hours of a kind of fierce absent-mindedness, when his real self seems to be far away—as though in some feverish or ugly dream. He goes away and wanders about by himself. Mr. Sorell does not attempt to follow him, though he is always horribly anxious. And after some hours he comes back, limp and worn out, but quite himself again—as though he had gone through some terrible wrestle and escaped. “Mr. Sorell gave him, a little while ago, a wonderful new automatic thing—a piano-player, I think they call it. It works with a roll like a musical box and has pedals. But Otto can’t do much with it. To get any expression out of it you must use your hands—both hands; and I am afraid it has been more disappointment than joy. But there are rumours of some development—something electric—that plays itself. They say there is an inventor at work in Paris, who is doing something wonderful. I have written to a girl I know at the Embassy to ask her to find out. It might just help him through some weary hours—that’s all one can say. “The relation between him and Mr. Sorell is wonderful. Oh, what an angel Mr. Sorell is! How can any human being, and with no trouble at all apparently, be so unselfish, so self-controlled? What will any woman do who falls in love with him? It won’t make any difference that he’ll think her so much better than himself—because she’ll know the truth. I see no chance for her. My dear Nora, the best men are better than the best women—there! But—take note!—I am not in love with him, though I adore him, and when he disapproves of me, I feel a worm. “I hear a good deal of the Fallodens, but nobody sees them. Every one shrinks from pestering them with society—not from any bad feeling—but because every one knows by now that they are in hideous difficulties, and doesn’t want to intrude. Lady Laura, they say, is very much changed, and Sir Arthur looks terribly ill and broken. Aunt Marcia hears that Douglas Falloden is doing all the business, and impressing the lawyers very much. Oh, I do hope he is helping his father! “I can’t write about him, Nora darling. You would wonder how I can feel the interest in him I do. I know that. But I can’t believe, as Otto does, that he is deliberately cruel—a selfish, hard-hearted monster. He has been a spoilt child all his life. But if some great call were made upon him, mightn’t it stir up something splendid in him, finer things than those are capable of ‘who need no repentance’?