"Well," the other retorted, "that is the most sensible thing he ever did. He was sane enough when that was drawn. You must remember, it is fourteen years old."

Now the lawyer turned to Clay and Charlotte. "It is agreed, then, that I shall read this aloud?" he asked, looking from one to the other.

"Fire away," from Clay; and his sister supplemented, "If we can't bear it, we can stop you."

Although there were times during the reading when she hid her face in her hands and wept softly; when Clay or the Doctor or both sat with white set faces, with clenched hands and rigid jaws, to the credit of their self-control may it here be set down, that there was no interruption until Mr. Nettleton had quite finished.

That which follows is merely a précis of what constituted a remarkable document. Those portions deleted, comprising quite a half of the writing, are nothing more nor less than a manifestation of Slade's arrant egotism, his innate selfishness, an almost fiendish vindictiveness, and a seemingly inborn malevolence that was baffled at every turn. Indeed, the one bright spot in the entire writing—his professed affection, if so tender an emotion can be associated with his nature—is all the more extraordinary because it stands alone among all the man's ungenerous impulses and thwarted ambitions. Those portions may well be dispensed with; they are simply unpleasant reading. Otherwise the document is given as he wrote it.

CHAPTER VII
"SLADE'S BLESSING"

To begin with, I was unfortunate in being born the son of an overseer. The generation that has come since the war recks little how pregnant this simple statement is. It bestowed upon me an ethic value somewhat lower than that possessed by the meanest nigger on Richard Fairchild's plantation. They had a place; I had none. Besides, my father was a rascal and a thief, possessing not a single leavening trait or characteristic; for he was without any refinement or culture, impenetrable to any noble sentiment—coarse and vulgar to the end. God! Could human effort come to aught in the face of such overwhelming odds? Yet, one helping hand, an occasional encouraging word from those who usurped position and authority, one sympathetic soul to spur my honorable aspirations, and I had been a better man. But, with one exception, that helping hand, the encouraging word, were withheld; the sympathetic spirit did not exist. God bless Elinor Clay, and reward her with a saint's crown of glory; may He everlastingly damn the rest! ...

Most vicious of all—proud, stiff-necked, sick in his self-esteem, overweening, and malicious—was Peyton Westbrook. From the first he stood in my path, thwarting and despising me, looking upon William Slade as something less than the dirt beneath his aristocratic feet. What was Peyton Westbrook that I was not? We were man and man. Had our positions been reversed, his would have been a wretched lot, indeed. Small of soul, narrow of mind, regardless of any interest that did not harmonize with his own, he would have remained the overseer's son, to live unhonored, and, dying, to pass into an oblivion merited by his worth; while I, William Slade, endowed with intellect and fine sensibilities, might have risen to greatness, the limits of which I hesitate to define. But no; he was born to the purple; it was given him to make such futile and petty uses of his father's fortune and position as his little mind and mediocre abilities could devise; while I, not lacking in all those naturally inherent qualities which made me in every way his superior—except the one of position—must stand in the background of obscurity and console myself as best I could for Life's cruel arbitrariness in the selection of her favorites....

Peyton Westbrook loved—nay, I cannot prostitute the word to such base use; he coveted Elinor Clay and her acres. I loved Elinor Clay. So did Richard Fairchild, poor creature that he was....