"You don't understand, Dick. Everything is changed. It is now Lady Woodroffe who would spare him nothing. It is his mother who would save him from everything."
Dick looked at the pale woman lying on the sofa. Then he understood, and a tear stood in his eye. 'Twas a tender heart. He went over to the sofa and kissed her forehead.
"Oh, Dick!" she murmured. "Would to God you were my son! As for him, he is what they have made him."
They had made him grumpy and obstinate. At that moment the doctor was urging upon him compliance with a simple thing.
"You want me to go to the rooms of the gardener man who insulted me? I am to listen to some rubbish about his wife. What do I care about his wife? I tell you, Sir Robert, this is trifling. I won't go, there; tell them so. I won't go."
"Then, Sir Humphrey, I tell you plainly, Ruin stares you in the face. Yes; the loss of everything in this world that you value--everything. You will lose all. I cannot explain what this means. But you will have letters to-morrow which will change your whole life--and all your thoughts. They mean, I say, the loss of everything that you value."
"You wanted to know what Mr. Haveril meant, what your mother meant, what Miss Molly Pennefather meant. They meant Ruin--Ruin, and loss of everything, Sir Humphrey--that and nothing else."
"I shall tell you no more. I shall leave it to your--to Richard Woodroffe, whom you love so well. He will tell you."
The young man hesitated. "What do you want me to do?"
"You are to come with me to Mrs. Haveril's rooms; she will receive you; she will make a communication to you. Whatever she says you are to receive with courtesy--with courtesy, mind. That done, you may return, and everything will go on as usual. You can then forget what you heard. Are you ready? Very well."
"Hark ye, Sir Humphrey, if you behave or speak like a cub and a cur, I throw you over. By the Lord! I will have no mercy upon you. I will tell you myself what it all means. Now!"
Molly waited, sitting beside Alice, who lay with closed eyes. Perhaps she slept. Presently John Haveril came home. Molly told him what had happened.
"Ay, ay," he said. "Let him come. Let Alice have her say. They've made a cur of him between them. Let him come."