In the room itself there was no sound save the scratching of the pen and the laboured breathing of the old man; but in the next house we could hear someone playing a waltz.

Somehow it did not seem to me incongruous, for it was 'Sweethearts,' and that had been the favourite waltz of Ben Rhydding, so that I always connected it with Derrick and his trouble, and now the words rang in my ears: "Oh, love for a year, a week, a day, But alas! for the love that loves alway." If it had not been for the Major's return from India, I firmly believed that Derrick and Freda would by this time have been betrothed.

Derrick had taken a line which necessarily divided them, had done what he saw to be his duty; yet what were the results?
He had lost Freda, he had lost his book, he had damaged his chance of success as a writer, he had been struck out of his father's will, and he had suffered unspeakably.

Had anything whatever been gained?
The Major was dying unrepentant to all appearance, as hard and cynical an old worldling as I ever saw.

The only spark of grace he showed was that tardy endeavour to make a fresh will.
What good had it all been?
What good?
I could not answer the question then, could only cry out in a sort of indignation, "What profit is there in his blood ?" But looking at it now, I have a sort of perception that the very lack of apparent profitableness was part of Derrick's training, while if, as I now incline to think, there is a hereafter where the training begun here is continued, the old Major in the hell he most richly deserved would have the remembrance of his son's patience and constancy and devotion to serve as a guiding light in the outer darkness.
The lawyer no longer wrote at railroad speed; he pushed back his chair, brought the will to the bed, and placed the pen in the trembling yellow hand of the invalid.
"You must sign your name here," he said, pointing with his finger; and the Major raised himself a little, and brought the pen quaveringly down towards the paper.