He rose, and went to the next room--the "Peter's study" of the old days--to get something from his desk there. Travice happened to look at Lucy, and saw her eyes fixed upon him with a troubled, earnest expression. She blushed as he caught their gaze. "What's the matter, Lucy?" "I was wondering whatever you would do, if Mr. Arkell does give up." "I think I should be rather glad of it? I could turn astronomer." "Turn astronomer! But you don't really mean that, Travice?" He laughed. "I should mean it, but for one thing." "What is that one thing?" "That it might not find me in bread and cheese. Perhaps they'd make me honorary star-gazer at the observatory royal. The worst is, one must eat and drink; and the essentials necessary for that don't drop from the clouds, as the manna once did of old. Very convenient for some of us if it did." "I wish you'd be serious," she rejoined, the momentary tears rising to her eyes. She was feeling wretchedly troubled, she could not tell why, and his light mood jarred upon her. It changed now as he looked at her. Travice Arkell's face changed to an expression of deep, grave meaning, of troubled meaning, and he dropped his voice to a low tone as he rose and stood near Lucy, looking down upon her. "I wish I could be serious; I have wished it, Lucy, this long while past. Other men at my age are thinking of forming those social ties that man naturally expects to form; of gathering about him a home, and a wife, and children. I must not; for what I can see at present, they must be denied to me for good and all; unless--unless----" He broke off abruptly. Lucy, suppressing the emotion that had arisen, glanced up at him, as she waited for the conclusion. But the conclusion did not come. "You see now, Lucy, why I cannot be serious. Perhaps you have seen why before. In the uncertain state that our business is, not knowing but the end of it may be bankruptcy----" "Oh, Travice!" she involuntarily exclaimed, in the shock that the word brought to her. "I do assure you it has crossed my mind now and then, that such may be the final ending. It would break my father's heart, I know, and it would half break mine for his sake; but others in the town have succumbed, who were once nearly as rich as we were, and the fate may overtake us. I wish I could be serious; serious to a purpose; but I cannot." "I wanted to show you a prospectus, Travice, that was left here to-day," interrupted Peter Arkell, coming back to the room. "I wonder what next they'll be getting up a company over? I put it into my desk, but I can't find it. Lucy, look about for it, will you?" She got up to obey, and Travice caught a sight of the raised face, whose blushes had been hidden from him; blushes called forth by his words and their implied meaning. She had understood it.