After a moment he added:
"Neither my lady nor Marius will understand, and I cannot explain, so it is very quickly over—one word, after all."
"Ruin," said Susannah Chressham.
"It has been the Lyndwood way, has it not? It is twelve years to-morrow since they brought my father home—do you remember?"
"Yes," she answered.
"He tried to speak to me," said the Earl softly. "I knew what he meant—be generous to Marius. That occurred to me last night when I faced it, and that it would also be the easiest way for me—a duel in Hyde Park."
He laughed.
And Susannah Chressham was silent.
They turned the bend of the avenue and saw before them the straight front of Lyndwood House.