When the tornado had passed, Éloise rose, smoothed her dress, opened the window that the morning air might cool her burning eyes, then at length went to find a servant who would take her trunk to the Murrays', and passed down the hall.
As she reached the door of the long, antique room where last night's scene had passed, it opened, and Mr. St. George Erne came out.
"Good morning, Miss Changarnier," said he. "May I speak with you a moment?"
"Very briefly," said Éloise, loftily, for she was in an entirely different mood from that in which she had left him the night before.
The corner of a smile curled Mr. St. George Erne's mouth and the brown moustache above it. Éloise saw it, and was an inch taller. Then St. George did not smile again, but was quite as regnantly cool and distant as the Khan of Tartary could be.
"I glanced at the papers to which you referred me last evening," said he. "As you intimated, I perceive the snarl is hopeless. Were it for nothing else," he added, casting down the orbs that had just now too tremulous a light in them, "I should ask you to remain and assist me in unravelling affairs, for a few days. I intend, so soon as the way shall be clear, to set off half of the estate to you"—
"Sir, I do not accept gifts from strangers. I will be under no obligations. I hope to earn my own livelihood. The estate is yours; I will not receive a penny of it!"
"Pardon me, if I say that this is a rash and ill-considered statement. There is no reason why you should be unwilling, in the first place, to see justice done, and, after that, to respect your Adopted father's wish."
"My father could have wished nothing dishonest. He is best pleased with me as I am."
"Will it make any difference, if I assure you that the half of the estate under my plan of management will yield larger receipts than the whole of it did under your proprietorship?"