"It is certainly not justice, your lordship," he admitted,--"it is not even reasonable--but it is the law." The Marquis produced a gold cigarette case, absently lit a cigarette, and returned the case to his pocket without offering it to his companion. He smoked meditatively and sipped his second glass of sherry. "A state of things," he declared, "has been revealed to me which I cannot at present grasp. I must discuss the matter with Robert--with my son-in-law, Sir Robert Lees. He is an intensely modern person, and he may be able to suggest something." "Sir Robert is a very clever man," the lawyer acknowledged, "but failing an arrangement with the tenant himself, I cannot see that there is anything further to be done. We have, in short, exhausted the law." "A process," the Marquis observed sympathetically, "which I fear that you must have found expensive, Mr. Wadham." "The various suits into which we have entered on behalf of your lordship, and the costs which we have had to pay," the latter hastened to announce, "amount, I regret to say, to something over eighteen thousand pounds." "Dear me!" his companion sighed. "It seems quite a great deal of money." "Since we are upon the subject," the lawyer proceeded, "my firm has suggested that I should approach your lordship with regard to some means of--pardon me--reducing the liability in question." So far as the face of Mr. Wadham's client was capable of expressing anything, it expressed now a certain amount of surprise. "It appears to me, Mr. Wadham," he remarked, "that you are asking me to attend to your business for you." The lawyer knitted his brows in puzzled fashion. "I am not sure that I quite follow your lordship," he murmured. "Do I employ you," his patron continued, "to manage my estates, to control my finances, to act as agent to all my properties, and yet need to keep a perspective myself of my various assets? If eighteen thousand pounds is required, it is for your firm to decide from what quarter the money should come. Personally, as you know, I never interfere." Mr. Wadham coughed in somewhat embarrassed fashion. "As a matter of fact, your lordship," he confessed, with a most illogical sense that it was his duty to apologise for his client's impecuniosity, "as a matter of fact, neither my partners nor I can at the present moment see where a sum of eighteen thousand pounds can be raised." The Marquis rose to his feet and shook the cigarette ash carefully from his coat. "Our conversation, Mr. Wadham," he said, "is reaching a stage which bores me. I have just remembered, too," he added, with a glance at the clock, "that my daughter is entertaining a few friends to lunch. You must write to Merridrew. He is really a most excellent agent. He will tell you what balances are likely to be available during the next few months." Mr. Wadham received the suggestion without enthusiasm.