"He does, though. He wants to get away--to earn his own living--make a
way for himself."

"That's the first I've heard of it," said Austin, genuinely surprised.
"I really thought he was perfectly contented here. Of course, now and
then he's grumpy--but he always has had fits of grumpiness. What kind of
work does he want?"

"Something to do with sheep or cattle--in Arizona or New Zealand--the
place doesn't matter--any open-air life."

Austin lit another cigarette and walked about the room. He was a man of
well-regulated habits, and did not like being taken unawares. Dick
ought to have told him. Then there was their mother. Who would look
after her? Dick was a dispensation of Providence.

"Perhaps I might be a deputy dispensation, mightn't I?" said Viviette.
"I don't think mother is so desperately attached to Dick as all that. It
could be arranged somehow or other. And Dick is growing more and more
wretched about it every day. Every day he pours out his woes to me till
I can almost howl with misery."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Not to stand in his way if he gets a chance of going abroad."

"Of course I won't," cried Austin eagerly. "It never entered my head
that he wanted to go away. I would do anything in the world for his
happiness, poor old chap. I love Dick very deeply. In spite of his huge
bulk and rough ways there's something of the woman in him that makes one