‘Well, Marcia, I’ll see that it goes. I don’t know—it may do some good, after all.’ He paused awkwardly a moment and held out his hand. ‘Am I forgiven?’ he asked. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything against your father; but he’s my brother, remember, and while I abuse him myself I wouldn’t let an outsider do it. You are right; he doesn’t know what he is doing. You must forget what I said. I have thought about it too much. Every one in Italy believes that I have an interest in the deal; and when I am doing my best to help things along, it is a little hard, you know, to be accused—by the very people I am giving to—of being the cause of their distress.’ ‘Yes, Uncle Howard, I understand; I don’t blame you,’ she returned, with a note of weariness in her voice; ‘but—papa is really the kindest man in the world.’ ‘Ah, Marcia, a very kind-hearted man nowadays can do a great deal of harm by telegraph without having to witness the results.’ Sybert crossed the room toward her with a curious deep look in his eyes. He half held out his hand, but Marcia turned away without appearing to notice, and picking up her uncle’s cheque-book from the table, she tore out a leaf and scrawled across the face. ‘There’s some money for the Relief Committee,’ she said, as she tossed the slip of paper across the table toward him. ‘That’s all I have in the bank just at present, but I will give some more as soon as I get it.’ Sybert’s face was equally impassive as he glanced from the paper back to her. ‘Thirteen thousand lire is a good deal. Do you think you ought——’ ‘I do as I please with my own money—this _is_ my own,’ she added in parenthesis. ‘My mother left it to me.’ ‘As you please,’ he returned, pocketing the slip with a half-shrug. ‘I know a village in Calabria that will be very grateful for a little help until the olives ripen again.’ ‘Dinner is served,’ announced Pietro in the doorway. Marcia nodded to the two men.