Pyramids of snow

by Edith Metcalfe

"Don't ask leading questions, and please don't make yourself ridiculous. Civility costs nothing, and it amused me to be civil to that—gentleman."

"It is rare for you to be amused with anything that costs nothing," he retorted, but Mrs. Sinclair would not be drawn. She began to play again, and, when at last she stopped, the little man's carrying capacity was taxed to take her winnings back to her hotel.

It would be a vain task to try to record all Melville Ashley's thoughts as the train bore him across France; in the aggregate they amounted to little less than a comprehensive cursing of everything and everybody, including himself. For his position was desperate.

The younger son of his parents, both of whom had died while he was still an infant, he had been brought up with his brother Ralph under the guardianship of his uncle, Sir Geoffrey Holt, lord of the manor of Fairbridge, in Surrey, whose co-heir, at any rate, he hoped some day to be. Sir Geoffrey had played his part well, placing every advantage in the way of both his nephews, but as the years slipped by he found it difficult to be quite impartial in his personal treatment of the two lads, though he never failed to be impartial in his dealings with them so far as they affected the education and up-bringing of the boys.

It was Ralph, however, who engrossed his uncle's affection, and something in Melville's nature rose in rebellion at the thought that he came second in the estimation of any person. Both boys were handsome, Melville especially so; both were well endowed with intelligence, and both took advantage of their opportunities. But whereas Ralph developed into a frank and unaffected man, fond of athletics and outdoor pursuits, Melville became more and more self-centred and reserved, devoting all his time to his one absorbing love of music. Manhood brought liberty, and liberty in Melville's case brought lack of self-restraint. His finer qualities led him into a certain sort of temptation, and the men with whom his rare musical talents brought him into contact were of a free and easy Bohemian type that did not afford the most healthy companionship for a young fellow of his particular temperament. Musical evenings led to smoking concerts, and the concerts to late nights of which other and less innocent amusements were the principal feature; billiards and cards became first a habit and then a passion, and Melville was still in his early twenties when it was obvious that he was a confirmed gambler.

Sir Geoffrey was patient and he was rich, but detestation of the gambler was added to his dislike of his younger nephew, and more than one violent quarrel had taken place between the two. It says much for the elder man that he never referred to the position of absolute dependence occupied by the younger one; but when, a few weeks before, Melville came to him with the oft-repeated tale, Sir Geoffrey spoke his mind in the vernacular.

"Let me know the sum total of your accursed debts," he said, "if you have the honesty or the wit to remember them, and I will clean the slate. Then I will give you a final two hundred and fifty for yourself, and that shall be the end."

When Melville gave him the damning list of debts, Sir Geoffrey bit his lips until they bled. Livery stables, and wine and cigar merchants told a tale of luxurious living which Sir Geoffrey himself had never been able to afford in his younger days, and there were other items not precisely specified, into which the elder man thought it better not to enquire too curiously. But he kept his word. He drew crossed cheques payable to every person named in the list for the full amount, and demanded a receipt from each in full discharge of his nephew's liability. When the last receipt came in, after a miserable week of waiting, he sent for Melville to his library.

"Is that the last?" he enquired grimly, and Melville assented. Then Sir Geoffrey sat down at his table and drew one cheque more. "There is the two hundred and fifty I promised you," he said; "make the best use of it you can, for it is the last you ever have from me. The dog-cart will take you to the station in half-an-hour." Then he turned on his heel and left him, and Melville returned to town.

Five weeks before! And now the whole of the money was gone. With all his ingenuity it would be difficult to invent a story which his uncle would be likely to accept as a valid explanation of so surprising a fact.