"An' don't forget the wife and daughter." The wife and daughter should come round too. And then as the lord of Strathfieldsaye said, "Good-night, Mossop," and was about to turn away from the open gate, he felt suddenly the hand of the solicitor upon his shoulder and the impact of a pair of grave, kind eyes. "I wish, my dear friend," said Lawyer Mossop, "you could see your way to taking a fortnight to think over that little matter." It was not mere conventional man-of-the-worldly good feeling. It was the human father, and the sheer unexpectedness of the obtrusion through the highly polished surface of the city's foremost solicitor caused his client to take a sharp breath. But Josiah's strength had always been that he knew his own mind. And he knew it now. "No, Mossop." A final shake of the dour head. "That gel is comin' out of my will. Good-night." The solicitor sighed gently and closed the gate. And then he stood a moment to watch the slow-receding lurch of the elephantine figure up the road. VII "If that boy had lived--which he didn't," reflected the lord of Strathfieldsaye as he opened carefully the fresh painted gate of his own demesne, "I'd like him to have been educated at Rugby." Lawyer Mossop had been educated at Rugby. Somehow that gentleman always left in the mind of this shrewd, oddly perceptive client an impression of being "just right," of not having anything in excess. His reputation in Blackhampton was very high. Just as Dr. Perrin had been for years its leading physician, Mr. Mossop had been for years its leading lawyer. To be a patient of the one, a client of the other, almost conferred a diploma of merit. Not only was it a proof in itself of social standing, an ability "to pay for the best," but it also expressed a knowledge, greatly valued by the elect, that the best was worth paying for. Josiah was a firm believer in that maxim. Still ... he closed the gate of Strathfieldsaye as carefully as he had opened it ... when all was said education was dangerous. Up to a point a good thing, no doubt. You couldn't be a Lawyer Mossop without it. But it was like vaccination: some people it suited, others it didn't. There was a trim slight figure coming down the path, in a hat not without pretensions to fashion. "Leaving us, Gert?" said Josiah. "Better stop to supper." Miss Preston reluctantly declined the invitation. "Why not? Always a knife and fork for you here, you know." "I'd love to, Josiah, but they'll be waiting for me at home." "Well, if you won't, you won't--but you'd be very welcome." And then he embraced the house and its surroundings in a large gesture. "One better than Waterloo Villa, eh?" "It is," said Gerty, with tempered enthusiasm. She looked at her brother-in-law with wary eyes. "You must be a very rich man, Josiah."