“Ye’re young yet; when ye feel inclined to give your heart to any young thing that you’ve a caring for, gie it as on the altar of God, and not for what ye’ll get in return, and if ye get in answer what ye’re wanting, thank God for a free gift.”

Then Alec knew that Sissy had been unkind to Bates.

The night being yet early, he willingly recognised an obligation to go and tell Miss Rexford that their mutual solicitude had in some way been rendered needless.  It was easy for him to find the lady he desired to see, for while the weather was still warm it was the habit in Chellaston to spend leisure hours outside the house walls rather than in, and Alec Trenholme had already learned that at evening in the Rexford household the father and brother were often exhausted by their day’s work and asleep, and the mother occupied by the cribs of her little ones.  He found the house, as usual, all open to the warm dry autumn evening, doors and windows wide.  The dusk was all within and without, except that, with notes of a mother’s lullaby, rays of candle light fell from the nursery window.  As his feet brushed the nearer grass, he dimly saw Miss Rexford rise from a hammock swung on the verandah, where she had been lounging with Winifred.  She stood behind the verandah railing, and he in the grass below, and they talked together on this subject that had grown, without the intention of either, to be so strong a bond of interest between them.  Here it was that Alec could give vent to the pity and indignation which he could not express to the man whose sufferings excited these emotions.

In spite of this visit Sophia sought Eliza again the next day.  As she entered the hotel Mr. Hutchins begged a word with her in his little slate-painted office, saying that the young housekeeper had not been like herself for some time, and that he was uneasy, for she made a friend of no one.

“Are you afraid of losing her?” asked Miss Rexford coldly, with slight arching of her brows.

He replied candidly that he had no interest in Eliza’s joys or sorrows, except as they might tend to unsettle her in her place.  Having, by the use of his own wits, discovered her ability, he felt that he had now a right to it.

Sophia went upstairs, as she was directed, to Eliza’s bedroom on the highest storey, and found her there, looking over piles of freshly calendered house linen.  The room was large enough, and pleasant—­a better bedroom than Sophia or her sisters at present possessed.  Eliza was apparently in high spirits.  She received her guest with almost loud gaiety.

“What do you think’s happened now, Miss Sophia?” cried she.  “You remember what I told you about Mrs. Glass?  Well, there’s two young gentlemen come to the house here yesterday morning, and she’s entertained them before at her house in town, so they struck up great friends with her here, and yesterday she had her supper served in the upstairs parlour, and had them, and me, and nobody else.  She says one of them saw me out yesterday morning, and was ’smitten’—­that’s what she calls it.”