One day, Mr. North, sitting on the short green bench in front of his choicest carnation bed, found two loving hands put round his neck from behind. He had been three parts asleep, and woke up slightly bewildered. "Bessy, child, is it you?" It was Mrs. Rane. Her footfall on the grass had not been heard. She wore a cool print dress and a black silk mantle; and her plain straw bonnet looked charming, around the pretty falling curls. Bessy looked quiet and simple at all times: and always a lady. "Did I startle you, papa?" "No, my dear. When I felt the arms, I thought it was Mary Dallory. She comes upon me without warning sometimes. Here's room, Bessy." She sat down beside him. It was a very hot morning, and Bessy unfastened the strings of her bonnet. There was a slight look of weariness on her face as if she were just a little worried with home cares. In truth she felt so: but all for Oliver's sake. If the money did not come in so freely as to make matters easy, she did not mind it for herself, but for him. "Papa, I have come to talk to you," she began, laying one of her hands affectionately on his knee. "It is about the tontine money. Oliver thinks that it might be paid to us conjointly; that it ought to be." "I know he does," replied Mr. North. "It can't be done, Bessy." Her countenance fell a little. "Do you think not, papa?" "I am sure not, child." "Papa, I am here this morning to beg you to use your interest with Sir Thomas Ticknell. Oliver knows nothing about my coming. He said last night, when we were talking, that if you could be induced to throw your influence into the scale, the bank might listen to you. So I thought that I would come to you in the morning and ask." "The bank won't listen to me, or to any one else, in this matter, Bessy. It's illegal to pay the tontine money over while two of you are living, and the Ticknells are too strict to risk it. I shouldn't do it myself in their places." "What Oliver says is this, papa. The money must, in the course of events, come to either him or me, whichever of us survives the other. We have therefore an equal interest in it, and possess at present an equal chance of succeeding to it. No one else in the wide world, but our two selves, has the smallest claim to it, or ever can have. We are the only survivors of the ten; the rest are all dead. Why, then, should the trustees not stretch a point and let us have the money while it can be of use to us conjointly? Oliver says they ought to do it." "I know he does," remarked Mr. North. "Has Oliver spoken to you, papa?" "No," said Mr. North. "I heard about it from Dick. Dick happened to be at the bank yesterday, and Thomas Ticknell mentioned to him that Dr. Rane had been urging this request upon them. Dick said Sir Thomas seemed quite horrified at the proposition; they had told Dr. Rane, in answer, that if they could consent to such a thing it would be no better than a fraud."