The civilian needed no reminder; indeed for the last ten minutes he had been distractingly conscious of a note for a thousand rupees lying in his despatch-box which might throw-some light on the mysterious disappearances. "Yes," he replied, "he did, and,--I see what you are thinking of, Marsden--he played _écarté_ too; but to tell the truth, he was so fuddled and excited that I refused to go on, and sent him home. See what comes of benevolence. If I had let him play and rooked him, he wouldn't have had the opportunity of brooding over difficulties and putting an end to them. Again, you see there's nothing so unsafe as unselfishness." Philip, remembering the notice of transfer he had found open by the dead man's side, wondered if matters might not have turned out differently had it been viewed by the calm light of day. "Well, it can't be helped now," continued the speaker. "I don't approve of what has been done, but I'll do my best,--in fact I'm bound as executor--to clear the matter up. Though I'm sure I don't know where the inquiry may not lead me. It's an infernal nuisance, nothing less! Well, hand me over the papers and--I suppose you've no objection to my searching the office?" "None; the Colonel's room is as he left it. I was afraid of noise so near the house." The speaker frowned at his own words, annoyed to find how thought for Belle crept into all his actions. "So far, good. And look here, Marsden, if you value that girl's opinion go and tell her the downright truth. She will be able to see you this afternoon." A piece of sound advice meant kindly, which had the not unusual effect of making the recipient hesitate about a course of action on which he had almost decided. In after years, when he considered the tangled clew Fate held at this time for his unwinding, he never hesitated to say, "Here I went wrong;" but at the time it seemed of small importance whether he saw the girl that day or the next. And once more the assumption of authority on John Raby's part irritated him into contradiction. "It will be a pity to disturb Miss Stuart's first day," he replied stiffly, and rode away. The young civilian shrugged his shoulders. Philip Marsden wasn't a bad fellow on the whole, but a prig of the first water. Imagine any one gifted with a grain of common sense acting as he had done! Why, if he wanted the girl's good graces, had he not paid up the rest of the money and finished the whole affair? It was a long price to pay, of course, but it was better than giving ten thousand for nothing. Only a morbid self-esteem could have prevented him. Really, the sense of duty to be found in some people was almost enough to engender a belief in original sin. The mere struggle for existence could never have produced such a congeries of useless sentiment.