"You are a vile man!" cried the dowager, with an inflamed face. "Pass me the wine."
He filled her glass, and left the decanter with her. She resumed.
"One day, when I was with Maude, in that last illness of hers in London, when we couldn't find out what was the matter with her, poor dear, she wrote you a letter; and I know what was in it, for I read it. You had gone dancing off somewhere for a week."
"To the Isle of Wight, on your account," put in Lord Hartledon, quietly; "on that unhappy business connected with your son who lives there. Well, ma'am?"
"In that letter Maude said she wished me to have charge of her children, if she died; and begged you to take notice that she said it," continued the dowager. "Perhaps you'll say you never had that letter?"
"On the contrary, madam, I admit receiving it," he replied. "I daresay I have it still. Most of Maude's letters lie in my desk undisturbed."
"And, admitting that, you refuse to act up to it?"
"Maude wrote in a moment of pique, when she was angry with me. But—"
"And I have no doubt she had good cause for anger!"
"She had great cause," was his answer, spoken with a strange sadness that surprised both the dowager and Lady Hartledon. Thomas Carr was twirling his wine-glass gently round on the white cloth, neither speaking nor looking.