‘Yes, his mind is clear enough, so far as I have been able to discover; he is eccentric.’ ‘And grumpy.’ ‘Of a gloomy turn, no doubt. He goes nowhere, and receives no one, except Mr. Scratchell, his lawyer and agent. He seems like a man whose whole nature has been soured by a great sorrow. People say that his wife’s death broke his heart.’ ‘One would hardly suppose such a being could ever have had a wife--much less that he could have been fond of her. When did the lady die?’ ‘Don’t you remember? She died while we were at the Vicarage--about eleven years ago. There was a good deal of talk about it at the time. Mr. Harefield and his wife were travelling in Italy. Beatrix and her governess were with them--she was a child then, you know,--and Mrs. Harefield died very suddenly--after a few hours’ illness. It was a case of Asiatic cholera, I believe. People who know Mr. Harefield, or rather who knew him before that time--for he holds himself aloof from every one now--say that he has been a changed man since the shock of his wife’s death.’ ‘A melancholy story,’ said Kenrick. ‘I forgive him the discourteous grunt which was his sole recognition of my existence. Poor Beatrix! A sad beginning for her life.’ ‘Yes,’ answered Cyril, with warm interest. ‘Motherless so early--with so strange and gloomy a father. You cannot wonder that she is somewhat different from other girls.’ ‘Somewhat different from other girls,’ echoed Kenrick. ‘She is a queen compared with other girls. That is the difference. She is worth twenty other girls--a hundred--for she has a character of her own.’ Cyril looked at him curiously. “‘Praise from Sir Hubert Stanley!’” he exclaimed, ‘You are not often so enthusiastic, Ken.’ ‘Because I seldom see anything to praise--in a woman. Don’t be frightened, Cyril. I do admire Beatrix, but only as I admire anything else in nature that is noble and rare; and I know that you admire her with quite another kind of admiration, though you have not honoured me by communicating your ideas upon the subject.’ Cyril knocked the ashes out of his pipe on the old-fashioned hob, and said not a word until he had filled it again, slowly and thoughtfully. Clement Dulcimer was right when he called Cyril the handsomer of the two cousins. His pale clear-cut face was essentially noble. Yet it was by no means essentially attractive. That steadfast look and unchangeable gravity were unpleasing to many; but, on the other hand, Cyril’s rare smile was beautiful in all eyes. It was the sudden light of mind brightening the whole countenance; not a mechanical contraction of the lips revealing a fine set of teeth, and wrinkling the eyelids agreeably. It was a smile that meant sympathy, regard, beneficence--a smile that comforted and cheered. The miserable among his flock knew it well; society saw it seldom.