"Margaret," he said, "tell me now. What have I done?"
"Nothing—nothing!" she faltered through her tears.
"Then it was for no fault of mine; the change was in yourself," said he suddenly. "You had seen—you had loved; and it has been your turn to suffer."
"I have suffered, Claude," said Margaret withdrawing her hands from her face.
Her voice, her aspect, so inimitably tender and mournful, struck him to the heart.
She had gained courage and composure, and went on.
"And it is a comfort to me to have seen and spoken with you once again," said she; "because having done you an injustice, in my thoughts, I am glad to tell you so. I am pleased to think that you acted as I should have most desired, had I known the facts which were so cruelly perverted to me. But still—I hope," she added, as she rose to go, "that as I must remain here for the present, you will not often come to the house, because the sight of you reminds me too forcibly of those old times."
How exquisitely graceful she looked; with that imploring attitude—that bashful entreaty in her gesture.
"But, I don't understand—" he said, detaining her.
"No—it is a long story," said Margaret sadly.
"But why not tell it me? Have I not a right to know it? I, who love you better than any-thing in the world?"
Her smiles came back—her blushes.
"If you wish it," she said, "only not now. Still I must say for myself, that every one believed as I did. Even your friends here, entirely thought so till Mrs. Fitzpatrick set them right."
"But—believed what?"
"That you were engaged to Miss Fitzpatrick."
"What—engaged—and when? Good Heavens! And you, Margaret—to Miss Fitzpatrick! How could you believe such an incredible lie?"
"Don't ask me, Claude," said Margaret, feeling as if it really had been too bad in her to credit her own eyesight, as well as the assurance of every one she came near.
"And this is what has parted us for two years. Miss Fitzpatrick—but it is all clear now. You are satisfied—you are mine again—say so."
"You are a tyrant, Claude."
"But say it."
"I do say it—there, some one is coming. I must go."
Margaret flew up stairs. The ladies, satisfied that the storm was over, now came out, pale with fear and watching. Harriet's keen eye espied Mr. Haveloc leaning against the door of the conservatory.
"Marius among the ruins of Carthage," said she with a laugh.
"Marius! Mrs. Gage, can you say nothing better for me than that? Will you come to-morrow and fish with us?"
"Well; that is not a bad idea. I can throw a fly in a way that will make you jealous. Can you lend me a fishing-rod?"
"Twenty."
"And you don't mean to set out at an uncouth hour to-morrow?"
"Not at all—two or three o'clock."
"But I shall be jealous," said Lucy. "Do you not ask me to come too?"
"By all means; bring all the ladies who like angling. Lady James, will you answer for Miss Campbell?"
"I shall bring Margaret, I know;" said Harriet quickly.
"Do—if Miss Capel will come;" said he with a peculiar smile.
"I shall ask no questions;" said Harriet coolly. "I shall pack her up in a band-box, and take her; though she cannot angle like some people!"
"No; she cannot angle," said Mr. Haveloc; laughing at the angry expression in Harriet's face.
"Ah! you think yourselves, too deep for me;" said Harriet turning and walking up-stairs; "but I would have you look sharp; for I know the symptoms."
CHAPTER XIV
And though our joy is all too new to wear
The golden sweetness of assured repose,
Since the good Gods have steered our bark of life
Through the rough storm and the deceitful calm,
We may together stem the tranquil wave
Not fearful, not secure—but grateful ever;
While in the roseate light of new born hope
We steep the shadows of the coming time—
Most blest, that whatsoe'er our future lot
Love gilds the present, sanctifies the past.
Anon.
"I say, little one," exclaimed Harriet, as Margaret entered the Oratory to breakfast the next morning, "Will you go fishing with us to day, to Tynebrook?"
"With you—to Tynebrook, Harriet?" said Margaret quite surprised.
"Yes; did you never hear of such a place? Perhaps, you don't know that I saw Mr. Haveloc last night, and made a fishing party for the ladies?"
"Last night, Harriet!" said Margaret colouring.
"Yes, child," returned Harriet. "I suppose you think nobody can have interviews with a gentleman but yourself."
Never was a more random shot, but it had the effect of covering Margaret's face with blushes.
"How you love to torment Miss Capel;" said Mr. Gage, who was in the room. "I wonder she ever comes near you."
"I never saw any-thing like your cheeks, child," continued Harriet,
'They'll be in scarlet straight at any news.'
"Do have a little mercy, Harriet," said poor Margaret. "I cannot tell what you mean."
"I mean nothing more or less than this. You are to come with me to Tynebrook this morning, to learn how to angle; who knows what you may catch? I told Mr. Haveloc I should bring you, and he could not prevent me, though he seemed very much averse to your company."
Margaret smiled quietly at this remark, and Harriet turned to attack Everard, who entered the room at this moment.
"So here you are, slugs, who gave you leave to come and breakfast here this morning?"
"It is so dull, alone," said Everard, drawing his chair to the table.
"Where is your book, Sir? Have you learned that scene through? I have a great mind to hear you say it before I give you any coffee."
"I can't, Harriet," said Everard, quietly beginning his breakfast.
"Can't—what? Good gracious, that I should live to hear anybody say they can't!"
"I can't learn it; nor could you, if—" (here he stopped and took breath,) "if you did not know the English of it."
"If that is not a sufficient reason," said Mr. Gage, laughing, "I never heard one."
Everard went on peaceably eating his breakfast.
Harriet surveyed him in speechless indignation.
"He does not know the English of it!" she exclaimed at last; "he reads it like a parrot. Why even Captain Smithson—your prètendu, Margaret—knows French. It is something horrible. George, what shall we do?"
"Oh! Haveloc must take it now," said Mr. Gage, "he cannot have any real objection when he sees you in actual want of his assistance."
"Will you try to persuade him, Margaret?" said Harriet.
Margaret shook her head.
"It is a mere idle excuse," exclaimed Harriet after a pause, "I am sure, by the way he read that long scene with Camille, that he understood it."
"I know the meaning of part, but I cannot make it all out," said Everard.
"Then I will translate it for you. You give me an infinite deal of trouble, but I console myself by thinking how remarkably well you will look."
Everard, soothed by this little compliment, offered no opposition to the plan; and Harriet, rising from the table, said that if Margaret had breakfasted, they would go down stairs and arrange their expedition.
A similar desire seemed to possess the whole party of ladies—to learn to angle. Never did a more brilliant morning follow a stormy night. Mrs. Fitzpatrick said something about damp grass, but she was the only middle-aged lady present, and her hint fell to the ground.
Lady James and Miss Campbell, standing together, by the open piano, were engaged in an interesting conversation; Miss Campbell sometimes running over the keys with one hand, and looking down at the music book; Lady James approaching her head nearer and nearer in the earnestness of her discourse.
Harriet reclined in the corner of a couch, fixed her eyes, brimming with mischief, upon the talkers; and, although Lady James had the precaution to speak low, she caught a few fragments.
"He was absolutely rivetted by that song of Schubert's" said Lady James.
"It is one of my best," said Miss Campbell.
"The lilac bonnet to-day, my love, with the white china-asters."
"Yes, I intended—"
"You will be delighted with Tynebrook; it is the finest seat in this part of the country."
"Larger than Wardenscourt?" whispered Miss Campbell.
"Decidedly, and altogether a different style of place. A magnificent park; oaks that the Druids might have planted, and the house built in the quadrangular form like a Spanish convent."
"I like that sort of thing; but I fear he is rather difficult to—"
("To make a fool of," Harriet was almost tempted to add.)
"Not at all, my dear," pursued Lady James, "it is all manner; did I never tell you how he was drawn in by our good friend, Mrs. Maxwell Dorset?"
"No; I should like to hear it, of all things!"
"I'll tell you another time. Recollect, music is his passion. Talk of Spohr and Beethoven."
"I do so dislike a 'fanatico per la musica,'" said Miss Campbell.
"Yes, but a man of his standing in society," argued Lady James, "by the bye, I must secure him to drive with us to Tynebrook, this morning. You and him together; I will sit in front with Lord James."
Harriet sprang from the sofa, seized upon Margaret, who was quietly reading, and whirled her into the verandah. Lord Raymond, Mr. Gage and Mr. Haveloc were standing on the lawn. Mr. Gage smoking.
"Come here, some of you!" cried Harriet.
Mr. Haveloc instantly turned round, and rushed up the steps.
"At last!" he said, "I have been into the drawing-room half a dozen times, to see if you were not down."
"I have been there for ten minutes, I should think," said Harriet. "But I am afraid that pretty speech was not meant for me—perhaps, you took me for Mrs. Fitzpatrick?"
It did look as if he meant the speech for Margaret, since he took her hand and kept it.
"How did you sleep?" he asked Margaret.
"Very well, thank you, after all my fright," returned Harriet, "but it was a terrible storm, was it not Mr. Haveloc?"
"Ay—there was a storm last night," he said, as if just recollecting it.
"Did not you hear something of it then —you ought, I am sure; for I found you all among the broken glass."
"Will you give me a lift, Mrs. Gage, this morning," he asked.
"With all my heart," said Harriet, "I take Margaret and Mrs. Fitzpatrick; there is just room for you, if Margaret has no objection."
"Not any, Harriet," said Margaret quietly.
"George!" cried Harriet, "I am going to run off with Mr. Haveloc."
"Pray do," replied Mr. Gage.
"You will never see me again, after this morning!" she exclaimed.
Mr. Gage laughed and lit another cigar.
"There is a sort of stupid tranquillity about those Gages," said Harriet, "I had hoped that George was an irascible person; but he grows more and more like his father."
"That is a high compliment, Harriet;" said Margaret. "At–there was always a good deal of philandering between you and Uncle Gage," said Harriet; "you are an arrant little flirt in a quiet way."
"It must be a very quiet way, then;" said Mr. Haveloc, smiling.
"Don't you take her part!" cried Harriet, "you are on my side. George, I wish you would give me a cigar."
"Not I, indeed," said Mr. Gage.
"Then I will get one from Lord James;" said Harriet, coolly.
Mr. Gage came up to the verandah, and offered her his cigar case. Harriet took one.
"What are you going to do with it, Harriet?" asked Margaret.
"Nothing child—I have never smoked since the day I made you ill—but I don't choose him to refuse me any-thing. There, you stingy wretch, you may have it back again. Mr. Haveloc, tell me in confidence, what is your favourite colour for a bonnet?"
Mr. Haveloc laughed, and said that he had not made up his mind, but that when he saw Mrs. Gage's, he should be able to decide the point.
Lady James was not pleased when she saw Mr. Haveloc step into Mrs. Gage's carriage; but she contented herself by bringing up the old story of Mrs. Maxwell Dorset, and declaring that it was now the same thing over again, with Mrs. Gage; a very designing young woman with all her apparent frankness. Miss Campbell cordially agreed in this flattering verdict.
But if Harriet had heard this remark, she would only have laughed at it, with Margaret and Mr. Haveloc seated opposite to her, as her carriage swept through the park gates, and drove into the stately avenues of Tynebrook. They drove into the quadrangle through a grey archway, covered with ivy, and alighted at a stone entrance, divided by an oaken screen from the great hall.
"I say, little one, should not you like to have it?" asked Harriet, glancing round the splendid hall, "if you are very good, I'll see if I can help you."
Harriet equipped herself like a true angler, with a basket over her shoulder. Mr. Haveloc was buckling on her accoutrements for her, when the rest of the party crowded into the hall.
Lady James, though disturbed, did not allow herself defeated.
"Go to him, my love, and ask him to teach you to throw a fly," said she.
Miss Campbell took her advice, and succeeded, at least, in securing Mr. Haveloc's services. Having ascertained that Margaret was not going to fish, he selected a rod and a basket for Miss Campbell, put a fly on her line, and wished her success.
But Miss Campbell said she was such a novice, that Mr. Haveloc must kindly give her a little advice; and, at least, select for her a very fortunate spot.
So they all set off to the stream that ran through the park; a rough, brawling rivulet, that tumbled and foamed among rocky stones and straggling roots of trees.
Mr. Haveloc carried Miss Campbell's rod and basket; and having found a spot where there were no hawthorns near to intercept her line, he recommended her to begin forthwith.
She made a trial; but any one who has taken a fishing-rod in their hand for the first time, knows that it is by no means an easy task to guide it.
After several desperate manœuvres, in which she perilled herself and her neighbours, more than once, with the spike at the end, she gave up the attempt, and trusted to the sole attraction of her lilac bonnet.
Harriet was far up the stream with Mr. Gage; and Everard, who was wandering about with his play-book in his hand, finding Miss Campbell disengaged, insisted on her hearing him; and she had the delightful task of listening to his blunders, while she was calculating whether, if Mr. Haveloc proved obstinate, it would be possible for her to accept a younger son.
Mr. Haveloc had managed to detach Margaret from the rest of the party, and they sat watching the stream, as it glided through the tangled roots of the hawthorns.
They had time to say, not all they wished; but all there was any occasion for before they were interrupted; for Mr. Haveloc well knew the precise angle of the rocky bank at which they would be invisible to the party below.
Harriet, coming down with her basket on her shoulder, and her rod unjointed, was the first to discover them. She suspended her song; stood before them a minute, enjoying Margaret's rosy blushes, and Mr. Haveloc's look of extreme unconcern; and then shrugging her shoulders, and throwing down her basket on the grass, exclaimed:—
"Well! never say I did not have a hand in it."
The ladies had settled to go home after a late luncheon. The gentlemen adhered to their original plan.
Everybody thought Mr. Haveloc was rather particular in his attentions to Margaret; fortunately, for her comfort, they did not know how particular. They did not know that he had obtained her permission to write to Mr. Warde and to Mr. Casement, by that day's post. They did not know that when he went up to dress, the letters were written; and that Margaret's last words as he put her in the carriage, were to beg "that he would be very polite to poor Mr. Casement."
Harriet happened to be alone with Margaret, as Mrs. Fitzpatrick went back with Lady Raymond; and she caressed and teazed her alternately all the way home, but Margaret could now bear teazing very bravely.
This was destined to be a day of events, for when they returned to Wardenscourt, they found Captain Gage and Elizabeth already arrived. Lucy and Harriet, both warmly attached to Lady d'Eyncourt, flew to welcome her.
"And Margaret," said Elizabeth enquiringly, when she had embraced her cousins.
Margaret was in her arms at once, sobbing with joy and emotion. Elizabeth stroked down her hair, and spoke soothingly to her: she had grown older so fast, that Margaret was really a child to her now.
Captain Gage was in excellent spirits. He was come back to England, which delighted him, for he had no great taste for foreign parts. And now that the grief of Sir Philip's death was, with him, over, he felt that he had his daughter back again, all to himself, and that was a great source of consolation. He was sorry it happened that his sons were out fishing, but it was a capital day for sport, and he should see them in the morning, which after all, was almost the same thing. So he kissed Harriet again, and asked her whether she could give George a good character.
Elizabeth was beautiful in her weeds; she looked graver, older, and more serene. There was something in her slow and dignified movements, that reminded Margaret of Sir Philip. And though she suffered, as Schiller tells us as all great minds suffer, in silence and alone, yet those who knew her best, felt a certainty, (in her case fully confirmed by time), that she would never marry again. She seemed to feel, as the poets tell us, women felt in their days, that her destiny was accomplished, her part in the drama of life played out, that she had given her heart to her husband; and that to all eternity her soul was wedded to the soul that had preceded hers to Heaven.
With these peculiar views, a second marriage would have been to her a crime replete with horror and disgrace.
That many people regretted these views, and that some sought to change them, will not be wondered at, considering that, independent of her beauty and good private fortune, Sir Philip left her mistress and sole heiress of Sherleigh, expressing only a wish that if she should not marry again, it might go to some one of Captain Gage's descendants.
Every one, whom it nearly concerned, was pleased with Margaret's approaching marriage. Mrs. Fitzpatrick declared it was all that she could wish. Lady d'Eyncourt congratulated her warmly, her guardians gave a willing assent, Mr. Casement saying, that if Miss Peggy liked to venture upon the young man, it was her affair; that there was no mistake about his property, but that he thought him a violent fellow.
Elizabeth desired that Margaret should be married from Chirke Weston. Hubert was safe on the coast of South America, and there was no drawback to the plan. Captain Gage insisted upon giving her away. He said he had half a right to do so, since he had a narrow escape of being her father in earnest. For he still regarded Hubert's attachment to her as a childish piece of business, that would serve very well for a jest when one was wanting. So after the performance of the Vaudeville, which went off to admiration, the party at Wardenscourt broke up. The Gages and Raymonds, with Margaret and Mrs. Fitzpatrick started for Chirke Weston; and Mr. Haveloc was kindly invited to take up his abode with Mr. Warde, who was to perform the ceremony.
Margaret found many changes since she left that neighbourhood, though none so strange to her as the change in her own prospects. At the Vicarage, Mrs. Somerton still resided, but her eldest daughter was now with her; a sharp, fractious spinster, who seemed but a bad exchange for her wilful, pretty sister, now fortunately Mrs. Compton.
Mrs. Compton had a little girl, and was grown, her mother said, more steady; and Mr. Compton had just been in all the newspapers for playing at skittles before a church door, during divine service, at some place where he was quartered with a detachment. This last piece of information came from the acid sister; but Mrs. Somerton added that it was done for a bet, which in her opinion, at once explained and excused the action.
The Trevors had for some time been in possession of Ashdale. They were very nice people, and already extremely popular with the neighbours. They were particularly civil to Margaret, took care to call upon her and to invite her, and to express a great deal of pleasure in her intended marriage. They little knew that they owed to Margaret's forbearance the estate they were now enjoying; for a word from her would have caused Mr. Grey to alter again, before his death, the distribution of his property; and they rather grudged her the ten thousand pounds which her uncle did bequeath to her—for very nice people are sometimes niggardly in their ideas; they thought her own ten thousand pounds ample for a single woman, and now that she was about to make a grand marriage, it was still less needful to her; but as no means occurred to them of getting this money back again, they contented themselves with feeling the injury, and with fixing on little Richard, as the one of their children who would be sure to have had it, if Margaret had not robbed him of it.
But there were little private family feelings, which these nice people took care to keep to themselves. They were invited to the breakfast, very reluctantly, on the part of Harriet; who superintended everything, and who hated them because they happened to have five very plain children.
"Don't tell me, Uncle Gage, that it is not their fault!" she exclaimed, when Captain Gage ventured to remonstrate with her for her dislike. "Good people, always have handsome children. Your children were all handsome!"
Captain Gage was silenced by this logical inference, "his children were good looking, he must confess."
"Little sinners!" cried Harriet, "I'll have them all five to the breakfast, that I may make them ill for a fortnight. I know they are greedy by the look of them. I know they will eat as long as I choose to stuff them."
And little Mrs. Trevor, when she yielded to Harriet's earnest entreaties, that the five darlings should see the wedding and appear at the breakfast, little thought of the fate in store for them.
Harriet was now in the very midst of business, to the great contentment of her unquiet spirit. She assumed the direction of every thing; as Elizabeth was not in spirits to take an active share in such matters. But Harriet was in her element, inviting the company and arranging the breakfast, and holding secret committees, with Captain Gage.
And then the trousseau. She was a Queen among milliners and ladies' maids; and samples of gowns and bonnets. Her taste was admirable and most imperative; she would not allow an opinion but her own on the subject. Not a silk could be decided upon, unless she approved the colour; not a bonnet, unless she pronounced the shape to be faultless. Margaret submitted passively to all her directions, and bade Mrs. Mason to be equally submissive. This was difficult, because then Mrs. Thompson began to triumph over Mrs. Mason, and to intrude her advice upon matters with which, as Mrs. Mason said, she had nothing to do.
Then Harriet selected the bridesmaids, which was a matter of some nicety. She meant to have had six; but as she insisted upon their all being handsome, she soon found herself obliged to limit the number to four.
Whenever Mr. Gage was within hearing, she took care to regret over and over again that the untoward circumstance of her own marriage prevented her from offering herself in that capacity.
"You see," said Mr. Gage to Margaret, on occasion of one of these attacks, "what you are to expect; when you have been married six months, you will wish yourself single, that you may be bridesmaid to some of your friends."
"No, she will not!" cried Harriet, "you don't see the difference. Do you think, if I had married dear Mr. Haveloc, I should now wish I was single?"
Mr. Gage laughed, and said "that altered the case, he had no doubt; but people with a very little imagination might conjecture the degree of peace that would have been enjoyed by both parties, if Harriet had married 'dear Mr. Haveloc.'"
However, though she was not married to him; she enjoyed the great satisfaction of teazing him to her heart's content. She would come in with a solemn face, and assure him that his lawyer had died suddenly, and the settlements must be transferred into other hands; that his coach-maker had absconded, and he must send elsewhere for his carriage; or that Margaret was up-stairs ill with the influenza, and the doctor was sure it would prove a very tedious attack.
This was the last time she succeeded in mystifying him, for before she had finished speaking, he rushed past her, and up the stairs in search of Margaret, whom he met quietly coming down, in perfect health. Harriet declared that a very affecting meeting took place on the staircase, and made Captain Gage laugh very much with her account of it; but she could not get Mr. Haveloc to believe any more of her provoking tales.
But she could not let him entirely alone. She affirmed that with regard to ladies' dress, he had one single idea, an idèe fixe, which she was anxious to reason him out of.
This idea was a perfect mania for shawls. He presented Margaret with one costly shawl after another, till Harriet said, it was plain he thought ladies' dress consisted of nothing else; and she vowed, that Margaret should go to church on the day, clothed in every single shawl he had ever given her. And then she would draw such a lively picture of Margaret's appearance in this singular costume, as would set every one present laughing.
Then she was always alluding to Mr. Humphries, though this was partly to plague Margaret. She would mention the songs Mr. Humphries liked, and she would sing them of an evening with a great deal of pathos, directing the expression particularly to Margaret. If she happened to wear any thing particularly pretty, she would ask if it was not something of that sort that Mr. Humphries used to admire so much?
Mr. Haveloc was not of a more curious disposition than men in general, but it was natural he should wish to know why Harriet laid so much stress on this Mr. Humphries, and why Margaret should always colour when she did so.
Mr. Gage, who was present one evening when Harriet made one of these allusions, told him that Humphries was a country squire, who lived near Mr. Singleton; a good sort of man, whom he believed Miss Capel had refused when she was at Singleton Manor; that the poor fellow had a large property, but really was such a boor, that you could not be surprised at any woman refusing him.
Fortunately Harriet did not overhear this explanation, or she would have little thanked Mr. Gage for interfering with her concerns.
Mr. Casement was a good deal at Chirke Weston. He came sometimes on business, with Mr. Haveloc, but much more often because he had no where else to bestow himself.
He took an amazing fancy to Mrs. Gage, and, to Margaret's surprise, she seemed equally pleased with his society. He made Margaret very angry by saying the first morning he called, "I say, little woman, what a famous match Bessy Gaze will be for me now. I little thought she would have such an estate as Sherleigh, when I first engaged her for my second."
But when he repeated this jest to Elizabeth, she did not seem at all ruffled; she merely hoped that she should never have any more serious pretenders to her estate than Mr. Casement.
But the old man certainly admired Harriet the most. If she was not in the way when he called, he always asked where that handsome woman, Mrs. Gage was? And if she was in the garden, he would stand at the window watching her movements, and pointing out to Margaret how well she walked.
For Harriet, who darted about like lightening when she was in a hurry, walked with all the slow and undulating grace of a Spanish woman. Harriet used to question Mr. Casement very minutely respecting Margaret's early acquaintance with Mr. Haveloc.
"I advised the match, in the first instance," said Mr. Casement, "I told old Grey, (you did not know Grey, a worthy old soul, he left me a thousand pounds) I told Grey, that if he made up a match between his ward and Miss Peggy, he would be rid of the trouble of her."
"Then he made the match?" inquired Harriet.
"Not he! Grey was a child in such affairs. Miss Peggy was shy; Master Claude was sulky, and nothing came of it for a long time."
"And how did they understand each other?" asked Harriet.
"Why that, to tell you the truth, I don't know. I believe he hung so long about the house, that Master Grey asked him his intentions. And then, you know, the young man was obliged to speak out."
"But, then, Mr. Casement, what put it off so long?"
"Ah! that I can't tell exactly; but I suppose it was Master Claude's temper. He is a dreadful temper. Besides, he went off with a married woman in Italy."
"But that was before this affair," said Harriet.
"Was it? I don't know. I am rather sorry for Miss Peggy; she is a well-behaved little girl, upon the whole; but as people brew, so they must bake. Some people say that old Grey turned him out of the house, and would not hear of the match. I know this, that I caught him one evening making love; and the next day he was off. But old Grey was very close, in some things: he had his secrets. He rather wished her to marry Hubert Gage."
There was one thing in which Mr. Casement and Harriet cordially sympathised. He hated the Trevors.
"Nice people, ah! very nice, indeed," he exclaimed. "Everybody speaks well of them; 'so much the worse,' as the man says, in the 'School for Scandal.' A mean family, depend on it. A very attached couple; attached, because they have one interest in common; to scrape and save every farthing they can lay their hands upon. And the children; straggling all over Ashdale, and spoiling the furniture. Poor old Grey never liked children. 'I like 'em when they grow old enough to talk to,' he used to say. I will tell you when I like 'em—never! I should like to see Trevor begging about the streets, like a Manchester weaver, with his five children behind him."
When Harriet confided to Mr. Casement how she meant to serve the five children at the breakfast, his delight knew no bounds.
"Have 'em! cram 'em! the avaricious little villains!" he exclaimed. "Have them all, down to the stuffed pillow case on two legs, that they call baby! See, if I don't do 'em a good turn. I'll drown 'em in sack! I'll make 'em all drunk, or my name is not Roger Casement!"