"It leaves everything to Leah," his father informed him.
"Indeed! And what had Jim to leave behind him besides his character?"
"The insurance money."
"Oh--ah--yes. Jarvey Peel's present. Twenty thousand pounds--eh?"
"And accumulations," supplemented Lady Jim; "but need we talk of such things, now?" and she sighed the conversation back to sentiment.
"Quite so--quite so," quavered the Duke, shaking his head; "terrible loss to you, my dear--and your natural grief, and--hum-hum----" Further fossilised phrases escaped his memory.
"I certainly feel for poor Jim," said Leah, with sedate dignity: "he had his faults, of course; but then, so have I."
"Your kind remembrance of Jim excuses the few you possess," was Pentland's reply; while Frith, compressing his thin lips, made no remark.
Indeed, there was no chance, for Hilda clamoured that Leah should come to her house for beef-tea and consolation. She had never agreed with her more sceptical husband about the Curzon Street menage, and credited Lady Jim with the requisite virtues of a genuine widow.
"Your strength must be kept up, dear," she babbled, as though she expected Leah to faint then and there. "I know exactly how you feel. Just as I should, if Bunny became an angel. But we must all die, dear Leah, and death is the gate of life, and----"