There was a touch of mockery in these words, but Sandow did not appear to notice it. In his reply lay the same icy indifference which he had displayed in his conversation with Jessie.
"One must reckon with men as with figures; in that lies the whole secret of success. At all events, you have every reason to thank the present conjuncture. Besides all the other advantages, it secures my money to you. You know I have no other relative or heir."
"No other! Really?" asked Gustave in a peculiar tone, while he gazed fixedly at his brother.
"No!"
In that one short word what unbounded severity and determination!
"Then you have not altered your views. I thought that now years have rolled by you might have learnt to look differently on the past."
"Silence!" interrupted Sandow. "Name it not! The past has no existence, shall have no existence for me. I buried it when I left Europe for ever."
"And the recollection of it too!"
"Certainly! and I will not have it recalled by others. You have already attempted it several times in your letters, and I imagined my dislike to the subject had been shown plainly enough. Why do you always return to it? Is it to distress me, or"--here he fixed a threatening, penetrating look on his brother--"does some scheme lie at the bottom of this persistency?"
Gustave shrugged his shoulders slightly.