‘Very little. Indeed, I have never asked him anything--I could trust him with everything. It’s quite possible there may not be a penny; he may have spent it all on me before I came of age,’ said Lucian. ‘Still, if there is anything, it would go towards making up the nine thousand, wouldn’t it?’ ‘Well, leave it out of the question at present,’ she answered. ‘What else have you coming in soon?’ ‘Harcourt has two hundred of mine, and Robertson about three hundred.’ ‘That’s another five hundred. Well, and the rest?’ ‘I think that’s the lot,’ he said. ‘There are people who owe you money,’ she said. ‘Come, now, Lucian, you know there are.’ Lucian began to wriggle and to study the pattern of the hearthrug. ‘Oh! ah! well!’ he said, ‘I--I dare say I have lent other men a little now and then.’ ‘Better say given,’ she interrupted. ‘I was only wondering if there was any considerable sum that you could get in.’ ‘No, really,’ he answered. ‘Very well; then you’ve got fifteen hundred towards your nine thousand. That’s all, eh?’ she asked. ‘All that I know of,’ he said. ‘Well, there are other things,’ she remarked, with some emphasis. ‘There are your copyrights and your furniture, pictures, books, and curiosities.’ Lucian’s mouth opened and he uttered a sort of groan. ‘You don’t mean that I should--_sell_ any of these?’ he said, looking at her entreatingly. ‘I’d sell the very clothes off my back before I’d owe a penny to Darlington!’ she replied. ‘Don’t be a sentimental ass, Lucian; books in vellum bindings, and pictures by old masters, and unique pots and pans and platters, don’t make life! Sell every blessed thing you’ve got rather than owe Darlington money. Pay him off, get out of that house, live in simpler fashion, and you’ll be a happier man.’ Lucian sat for some moments in silence, staring at the hearthrug. At last he looked up. Sprats saw something new in his face--or was it something old? something that she had not seen there for years? He looked at her for an instant, and then he looked away. ‘I should be very glad to live a simpler life,’ he said. ‘I dare say it seems rather sentimental and all that, you know, but of late I’ve had an awfully strong desire--sort of home-sickness, you know--for Simonstower. I’ve caught myself thinking of the old days, and--’ he paused, laughed in rather a forced way, and sitting straight up in the easy-chair in which he had been lounging, began to drum on its arms with his fingers. ‘What you say,’ he continued presently, ‘is quite right. I must not be in debt to Darlington--it has been a most kind and generous thing on his part to act as one’s banker in this fashion, but one mustn’t trespass on a friend’s kindness.’ Sprats flashed a swift, half-puzzled look upon him--he was looking another way, and did not see her.