“Ah! you have gone through a great deal I am sure it has been a time of great trouble.”

“Indeed it has.  The suffering has become unceasing and often most severe, and there is grievous depression of spirits; I could not have left him even for a day, if he had not been so fervently bent on this.”

“Is he feeling his loss more acutely than at first?”

“Not so much that, as for the poor little boy, who is a heavy burthen on his mind.  He has lived in such a state of shrewd distrust that he has no power of confidence, and his complications for making all the boy’s guardians check one another till we come to a dead lock, and to make provision for Isabel out of Menteith’s reach, are enough to distract the brain of a man in health.”

“Is he fond of the child?”

“It is an oppressive care to him, and he only once has made up his mind to see it, though it is never off his mind, and it is very curious how from the first he has been resolved on your taking charge of it.  It is the most real testimony he could give you.”

“It is very comfortable not to be brought in like an enemy in spite of him, as even a year ago I could have been proud to do.”

“And I to have brought you,” he answered, “but it is far better as it is.  He is very cordial, and wants to give up the Auchinvar estate to me; indeed, he told me that he always meant me to have it as soon as I had washed my hands of you—­you wicked syren—­but I think you will agree with me that he had better leave it to his daughter Mary, who has nothing.  We never reckoned on it.”

“Nor on anything else,” said Ermine, smiling.

“You have never heard my ways and means,” he said, “and as a prudent woman you ought, you know.  See,” taking out his tablets, “here is my calculation.”

“All that!”

“On the staff in India there were good opportunities of saving; then out of that sum I bought the house, and with my half-pay, our income will be very fair, and there would be a pension afterwards for you.  This seems to me all we can reasonably want.”

“Unless I became like “die Ilsebill” in the German tale.  After four years of living from hand to mouth, this will be like untold gold.  To wish to be above strict economy in wheeled chairs has seemed like perilous discontent in Rose and me.”

“I have ventured on the extravagance of taking the ponies and little carriage off my brother’s hands, it is low enough for you, and I shall teach Rose to ride one of the ponies with me.”

“The dear little Rose!  But, Colin, there is a dreadful whisper about her going with her father, and Ailie too!  You see now his character is cleared, he has been offered a really lucrative post, so that he could have them with him.”

“Does he wish it?”

“I dare not ask.  I must be passive or I shall be selfish.  You are all my world, and Edward has no one.  Make them settle it without me.  Talk of something else!  Tell me how your brother is to be taken care of.”