They were letters about very insignificant affairs; the renewal of a lease or two; the reinvestment of a sum of money that had been lent on mortgage, and had fallen in lately; transactions that scarcely called for the employment of Mr.Saltram's intellectual powers.

But he gave them very serious attention nevertheless, well aware, all the time that this business consultation was only the widow's excuse for her visit; and while she seemed to be listening to his advice, her eyes were wandering round the room all the time, noting the dust and confusion, the soda-water bottles huddled in one corner, the pile of books heaped in a careless mass in another, the half-empty brandy-bottle between a couple of stone ink-jars on the mantelpiece.

She was thinking what a dreary place it was, and that there was the stamp of decay and ruin somehow upon the man who occupied it.

And she loved him so well, and would have given all the world to have redeemed his life.
It is doubtful whether Adela Branston heard one syllable of that counsel which Mr.Saltram administered so gravely.

Her mind was full of the failure of this desperate step which she had taken.