Admiral Chesterton stayed on at his niece's request for another week. She took him out to some of her favourite haunts, and talked to him a good deal about her aunt. "I feel comforted about her. Guy never left off reading to her at night till my wedding. And she seemed to like it and understand it. But since we have been away, I am afraid no one has continued it. Of course I feel that God could speak to her Himself and comfort her, but we do miss having a Protestant clergyman over here. Of course she would never have the Curé near her, though I believe he would have come. And he is such a really good little man that I'm sure he could have done her no harm. Guy says he means to take me into Orleans where there is a Protestant Service on Sundays. It seems so sad her being left quite alone the last week of her life with only Mathilde, who never seemed very fond of her mother." "Ah well," said the Admiral reassuringly, "you must think of God's mercy and love surrounding her. We can trust her to Him." He pleased Adrienne by saying that the Château was more comfortable and homelike than he had ever thought it could be. And when he left, he felt assured and relieved about her future. Mathilde outstayed him. She was collecting a good many of her mother's private possessions to take back to America with her. She was not at all pleased to find that her mother's money, which came to her by will, had virtually disappeared, been frittered away by the Countess, who was continually drawing on her capital for her needs, and she spoke rather angrily to Guy about it. "I thought you had made over the Château to my mother, yet I find you established in it before her death. It needs explanation." "That I can give you," said Guy quietly. He marched her off to the library, bade her be seated, and gave her a full and detailed account of her mother's debts and losses, and of the mortgage of the Château, which he had redeemed. She came out of that room a wiser and a sadder woman. But Adrienne felt hotly incensed at her imputations of Guy's honesty and fair dealing, and protested accordingly. "Guy gave Aunt Cecily money again and again; he was always paying her debts and putting her straight. You haven't given him a word of thanks or of gratitude for all he has done. Don't you realize that it is owing to him that Aunt Cecily was permitted to die in her own home. Her lawyer was turning her out of it and taking possession, when Guy arrived in the nick of time to prevent him." "I only know that I, as her daughter, ought to have some share in this property," said Mathilde. "You can only have that by sponging upon Guy. I should think you would have too much pride to ask him for what is legally his inheritance. It was his when he let Aunt Cecily live in it for her lifetime. It is doubly his, now he has paid up the mortgage for it." Mathilde was silenced.