‘That’s a little bit better,’ he said, and then he threw off his overcoat and scarf, and planted himself with his back to the fire, and the face which he turned to the light was the face of Mr. Desrolles. The man had aged within the last six months. Every line in his face had deepened. His cheeks were hollow, his eyes haggard and bloodshot. The sands of life run fast for a man whose chief nourishment is brandy. ‘Well,’ he exclaimed, in a hard, husky voice. ‘You do not welcome me very warmly, my child.’ ‘I did not expect you.’ ‘The surprise should be all the pleasanter. Picture to yourself, now, our meeting as it would be represented in a novel or a stage play. You would throw your arms wide apart, shriek, and rush to my breast. Do you remember Julia in the “Hunchback”? With what a yell of rapture she flings herself into Master Walter’s arms!’ ‘Do you remember what Master Walter had been to Julia?’ asked Laura, looking steadily into the haggard eyes, which shifted their gaze as she looked. ‘Real life is flat and tame compared with a stage play,’ said Desrolles. ‘For my part I am heartily sick of it.’ ‘I am sorry to see you looking so ill.’ ‘I am a perambulating bundle of aches. There is not a muscle in my body that has not its particular pain.’ ‘Can you find no relief for this complaint? Are there not baths in Germany that might cure you?’ ‘I understand,’ interrupted Desrolles. ‘You would be glad to get me out of the way.’ ‘I should be glad to lessen your suffering. When I last wrote to you I sent you a much larger remittance than I had ever done before, and I told you that I should allow you six hundred a year, to be paid quarterly. I thought that would be enough for all your requirements. I am grieved to hear that you have been obliged to ride in a third-class carriage in cold weather.’ ‘I have been unlucky,’ answered Desrolles. ‘I have been at Boulogne; a pleasant place, but peopled with knaves. I fell among thieves, and got cleaned out. You must give me fifty or a hundred to-night, and you must not deduct it from your next quarterly payment. You are now a lady of fortune, and could afford to do three times as much as you are doing for me. Why did you not tell me you were married? Pretty treatment that from a daughter!’ ‘Father,’ exclaimed Laura, looking at him with the same calm gaze which his shifting eyes had refused to meet just now, ‘do you want me to tell you the truth?’ ‘Of course. Whatever else do you suppose I want?’ ‘Even if it seems hard and cruel, as the truth often is?’ ‘Speak away, girl. My poor old bones have been too long battered about in this world for hard words to break them.’ ‘How can you ask me for a daughter’s dutiful love?’ asked Laura, in low, earnest tones. ‘How can you expect it from me? What of a father’s affection or a father’s care have you ever given to me? What do I know of your life except fraud and mystery? Have you ever approached me except in secret, and as an applicant for money?’