“She is ever so much wiser than I am,” he said. “So she had better be my treasurer. My property is all in stocks and shares. My grandfather was fond of stock-jobbing, and made some very lucky investments which he settled upon my mother, with strict injunctions that they should not be meddled with by her trustees. My share of her fortune comes to a little over nine hundred a year. I came into possession of it when I came of age, and it is mine to dispose of as I like, trusts expired, trustees cleared off--in point of fact, both gone over to the majority, poor old souls, after having had many an anxious hour about those South American railway bonds, and Suez Canal shares, which turned up trumps after all. I’ve telegraphed to the family lawyer for a schedule of the property, and when that comes, just tie it all up in as tight a knot as the law can tie, and let it belong to Allegra and her children after her. Consider me paid off.” Martin Disney laughed at the lover’s impetuosity--and told him that he should be allowed to bring so much and no more into settlement. Allegra’s income was less than two hundred a year, a poor little income upon which she had fancied herself rich, so modest is woman’s measure of independence as compared with man’s. It would be for the lawyer to decide what proportion the husband’s settlements should bear to the wife’s income. Father Rodwell had given Colonel Disney an introduction to a solicitor of high character, a man who had occupied an excellent position in London until damaged lungs obliged him to seek a home in the south. With this gentleman’s aid, matters were soon put in train, and while the men were in the lawyer’s office, the two women were choosing Allegra’s wedding-gown. The young lady had exhibited a rare indifference upon the great trousseau question. She was not one of those girls whose finery is all external, and who hide rags and tatters under æsthetic colouring and Raffaelle draperies. She was too much of an artist to endure anything unseemly in her belongings, and her everyday clothes, just as they were, might have been exhibited, like a Royal trousseau, without causing any other comment than, “How nice!” “What good taste!” “What exquisite needlework!” The hands which painted such clever pictures were as skilful with the needle as with the brush, and Allegra had never considered that a vocation for art meant uselessness in every feminine industry. She had attended to her own wardrobe from the time she learnt plain sewing at her first school; and now, as she and Isola looked over the ample array of under-linen, the pretty cambric peignoirs, and neatly trimmed petticoats, they were both of one mind, that there was very little need of fuss or expenditure. “I have plenty of summer frocks,” said Allegra. “So really there is only my travelling gown to see about, that is to say, the gown I am to be married in.”