"In what way can I help you?" she murmured, and the words appeared to come
from a heart of stone.

"There are many items I want cleared up, but I do not wish to distress you
unduly. Can you not refer me to your solicitors, for instance? I imagine
they will be able to answer all my queries."

"No. I prefer to deal with the affair myself."

"Very well. I will commence with you personally. Why did you quarrel with
your brother in London a few days before his death?"

"Because I was living extravagantly. Not only that, but he disapproved of
my manner of life. In those days I was headstrong and wilful. I loved a
Bohemian existence combined with absurd luxury, or rather, a wildly
useless expenditure of money. No one who knows me now could picture me
then. Yet now I am good and unhappy. Then I was wicked, in some people's
eyes, and happy. Strange, is it not?"

"Not altogether so unusual as you may think. Was any other person
interested in what I may term the result of the dispute between your
brother and yourself?"

"That is a difficult question to answer. I was very careless in money
matters, but it is clear that the curtailment of my rate of living from
£15,000 to £5,000 per annum must make considerable difference to all
connected with me."

"Had you been living at the former rate?"