And Cristiane came in first, slowly, reluctantly, as if to hear the wishes of her father, who had been her all, cut her to the heart, now that she would hear his voice no more. Ismay, her head held high as she saw Miles Cylmer without seeming even to let her eyes rest on his face, followed close behind. Last came the woman whom both the men standing up to receive distrusted and despised. Calm, pale, handsome, Mrs. Trelane swept in, and read nothing friendly in those waiting faces. Well, they would read the will! And then there would be the world to face again for Helen Trelane. There was not even a flicker of her lowered eyelids as she sat down. There would be no use in begging for mercy from men like these. She was ready for dismissal, as a man who has lost all is ready for death. Mr. Bolton, anxious to get his work over and be done, opened the envelope containing the two foolscap pages that Gaspard le Marchant had never signed. As he read, the silence of death was in the room. The world was going round dizzily to Mrs. Trelane as she listened. She, who sat there sick and hopeless, without a penny, was to have the sole guardianship of Cristiane till she was twenty-one; was to be allowed five hundred pounds a year for her life, to be shared with her daughter; was--her heart fairly turned over in her breast as the next clause came out--to be sole inheritrix if Cristiane were to die unmarried, or without children, and in that case everything would be Ismay’s in the end. She tried to speak, but there was only a queer little sound in her throat; and opposite her, in her pride and triumph, sat Miles Cylmer, who last night had insulted her when she was in despair. A hand of steel clutched her arm at the thought. “Don’t look like that!” Ismay’s furious whisper was low in her ear, as the lawyer went on reading unimportant clauses as to legacies to old servants. “Play your game! Be careful!” No one else heard the words, or knew even that the girl had spoken. Mrs. Trelane, with the paleness of death on her face, sat without moving, as quiet and apparently as calm as when she entered the room. Yet her heart was beating madly. “Safety, luxury, power!” it pounded in her ear. “Yours, all yours. A dead past, a living present! No more duns, no more striving.” In sheer terror, lest she should scream aloud in her joyful relief, lest it should be written on her face that Gaspard le Marchant was no more to her than a dead dog, Ismay tightened her warning hand till sheer pain brought her mother to her senses.