'What's all this?' asked John.

'Julia leaves this place tomorrow,' replied Morris. 'She must go up to

town and get the house ready, and find servants. We shall all follow in

three days.'

'Oh, brayvo!' cried John. 'But why?'

'I've found it out, John,' returned his brother gently.

'It? What?' enquired John.

'Why Michael won't compromise,' said Morris. 'It's because he can't.

It's because Masterman's dead, and he's keeping it dark.'

'Golly!' cried the impressionable John. 'But what's the use? Why does he

do it, anyway?'

'To defraud us of the tontine,' said his brother.

'He couldn't; you have to have a doctor's certificate,' objected John.

'Did you never hear of venal doctors?' enquired Morris. 'They're as

common as blackberries: you can pick 'em up for three-pound-ten a head.'

'I wouldn't do it under fifty if I were a sawbones,' ejaculated John.

'And then Michael,' continued Morris, 'is in the very thick of it. All

his clients have come to grief; his whole business is rotten eggs. If

any man could arrange it, he could; and depend upon it, he has his plan

all straight; and depend upon it, it's a good one, for he's clever, and

be damned to him! But I'm clever too; and I'm desperate. I lost seven

thousand eight hundred pounds when I was an orphan at school.'

'O, don't be tedious,' interrupted John. 'You've lost far more already

trying to get it back.'

CHAPTER II. In Which Morris takes Action

Some days later, accordingly, the three males of this depressing family

might have been observed (by a reader of G. P. R. James) taking their

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