John stopped and looked at the man. He did not know him. The decisive moment had come even before posting the letter.
"Now or never," whispered conscience.
"My name is Fane," he said, and passed on.
The man fell back at once and rejoined his companion.
"I told you so," he said. "That man is a deal too old, and he said his name was Fane. It's the other one in the tow wig, as I said from the first. That ain't real hair. It's the wig as alters him."
John posted his letter, saw it slide past recall, and then walked back to the hotel, found Archie in the sitting-room reading the playbills for the evening, and told him.
Perhaps nothing is more characteristic of our fellow-creatures than the manner in which they bear unexpected reverses of fortune. Archie had some of the callousness of feeling for others which accompanies lack of imagination. He had never put himself in the place of others. He was not likely to begin now. He had no intention of hurting John by setting his iron heel on his face. He had no idea people minded being trodden on. And, indeed, as John stood by the window with his hands clasped behind his back, he was as indifferent as he appeared to be to anything that Archie, pacing up and down the room with flashing eyes, could say. He had at last closed the iron gates of the irrevocable behind himself, and he was at first too much stunned by the clang even to hear what the excited young man was talking about. Perhaps it was just as well.
"By Jove!" Archie was saying, as John's attention came slowly back. "To think of the old governor at Overleigh, poor old chap! He has missed it all his best years, but I hope he'll live to enjoy it yet. I do indeed." Archie felt he could afford to be generous. "And Di, John, dear old Di, shall come and queen it at Overleigh. And she shall have a suitable fortune. I'll make father do the right thing by Di. He won't want to do more than he can help, because she has never been much of a daughter to him; but he shall. And when it's known, she'll marry off quick enough; and I'll see it gets about. And don't you be down-hearted, John. We'll do the right thing by you. You know you never cared for the money when you had it. You were always a bit of a screw, to yourself as well as to others—I will say that for you; but—let me see—you allowed me three hundred a year. Don't you wish now it had been four? for you shall have the same, if the old guv. agrees. And I dare say I shall be a bit freer with a ten-pound note now and then than ever you were to me."
"There will be no necessity for this reckless generosity," said John, wondering why he did not writhe, as a man might who watches a knife cut into his benumbed limb. It gave him no pain.
"And you shall have a hunter," continued Archie. "By Jove, what hunting I shall have! I shall get the governor to add another wing to the stables; and I will keep Quicksilver for you, John. You mustn't turn rusty because the luck has come to us at last. You know I knew all along I ought to have been the heir, and I put up with your being there, and never raised a dust."