‘Nice! It would have been my salvation, to have someone of my own kindred, quite my brother. I love Madoline, with all my heart and soul; but she is only my half-sister. I always feel that there is a difference between us. She is my superior; she comes of a better stock. Nobody ever talks of my mother, or my mother’s family; but Lina’s parentage is in everybody’s mouth; she seems to be related—at least in heraldry—to everybody worth knowing in the county. But Loftus would have been the same clay that I am made of, don’t you know, neither better nor worse. Blood is thicker than water.’ ‘That’s a morbid feeling of yours, Daphne.’ ‘Is it? I’m afraid I have a few morbid feelings.’ ‘Get rid of them. There never was a better sister than Madoline is to you.’ ‘I know it. She is perfection; but that only makes her further away from me. I reverence her, I look up to her and admire her; but I can never feel on an equality with her.’ ‘That shows your good sense. It is an advantage for you to have someone to look up to.’ ‘Yes; but I should like someone on my own level as well.’ ‘You’ve got me,’ said Edgar bluntly. ‘Can’t you make a brother of me for the nonce?’ ‘For ever and always, if you like,’ replied Daphne. ‘I’m sure I’ve got the best of the bargain. I don’t believe any brother would get up at five o’clock to teach me to row.’ Edgar felt very sure that Loftus would not have done it; that short-lived youth having been the very essence of selfishness, and debased by a marked inclination towards juvenile profligacy. ‘Brothers are not the most self-sacrificing of human beings,’ he said. ‘I think you’ll find finer instances of devotion in an Irish or a Scottish foster-brother than in the Saxon blood-relation. But Madoline is a sister in a thousand. Take care of that willow,’ as the boat shot under the drooping foliage of an ancient pollard. ‘How bright and happy she looked last night!’ ‘Yes; she had just received a long letter from Gerald, and he talks of coming home sooner than she expected him. He will give up his fishing in Norway, though I believe he had engaged an inland sea all to himself, and he will be home before the end of July. Isn’t it nice? I am dying with curiosity to see what he is like.’ ‘Didn’t I describe him to you?’ ‘In the vaguest way. You said I was sure to like him. Now I have an invincible conviction that I shall detest him; just because it is my duty to feel a sisterly affection for him.’ ‘Take care that you keep within the line of duty, and that your affection doesn’t go beyond the sisterly limit,’ said Edgar, with a grim smile. ‘There is no fear of the other thing.’ ‘What a savage look!’ cried Daphne laughingly. ‘How horridly jealous you must be of him!’ ‘Hasn’t he robbed me of my first love?’ demanded Edgar; ‘and now——’ ‘Don’t be so gloomy. Didn’t you tell me you had got over your disappointment, and that you meant to be a dear useful bachelor-uncle to Madoline’s children by-and-by?’