"I hadn't the money." Mr. Ransome closed his eyes again as if in pain. "I'd have given it you, Randall," he said, presently. He had opened his eyes, but they wandered uneasily, avoiding his son's gaze. "If I'd had it. But I hadn't. I've been doing badly." And again his eyelids dropped and lifted. "Things have gone wrong that hadn't ought to if I'd been what I should be." There was anguish in Ranny's father's eyes now. They turned to him for reassurance. As if in some final act of humility and contrition, he unbared and abased himself, he laid down the pretension of integrity. His shawl had slipped from his knees. His hands moved over it as if, having unbared, he now sought to cover himself. Ransome stooped over him and drew the shawl up higher and wrapped it closer with careful, tender touches. "Don't worry about that," he said. "Your Mother'll be all right, Randall. She's got a bit of her own. It's all there, except what she put into the business. You won't have to trouble about her." He paused. "Have you got the money now?" he said. "I shall have. To-morrow, probably." "Then don't you wait." "It'll be beastly work, you know, Father. Are you sure you don't mind?" "What _I_ mind is your being married to that woman. I never liked it, Randall." He closed his eyes. His face became more than ever drawn and peaked. His mouth opened. With short, hard gasps he fought for the breath he had so spent. Ransome's heart reproached him because he had not cared enough about his father. And he said to himself, "He must have cared a lot more than he ever let on." The way to the Divorce Court had been made marvelously smooth for him. His mother couldn't say now that it would kill his father. But on Monday morning things did not go with Ransome entirely as he had expected. Shaftesbury Avenue refused to lend him more than ten pounds on the security of his furniture. Still, that was a trifling hitch. Now that the proceedings had been consecrated by his father's sanction, there could be no doubt that his mother would be glad to lend him the five pounds. He would ask her for it that evening as soon as he got home. * * * * * But he did not ask her that evening, nor yet the next. He did not ask her for it at all. For as soon as he got home she came to him out of his father's room. She stood at the head of the stairs by the door of the room, leaning against the banisters. And she was crying. "Is Father worse?" he said. "He's going, my dear. There's a trained nurse just come. She's in there with the doctor. But they can't do anything." He drew her into the front room, and she told him what had happened. "He was sittin' in his chair there like he was yesterday--so bright--and I thought he was better, and I made him a drop of chicken broth and sat with him while he took it. Then I left him there for a bit and went upstairs to the children--Dossie was sick this morning--" "Dossie--?"