"Nothing. Except that my workmen are getting afraid to stir out at night, and the disaffection increases amongst the others. I cannot see what is to be the end of it," he continued. "I do not mean of this rivalry, but of the sad state to which the men and their families are reduced. I often wish I did not think of it so much: it is like a chain about me from which I cannot escape. I wish I could help them to find work elsewhere." "Ah!" said Mrs. Gass, "work elsewhere is very nice to think about in dreamland; but I'm afraid it'll never be seen for them in reality. It's not as if work was going a-begging: it has broken up everywhere, Mr. Richard; and shoals and shoals of men, destitute as our own, are tramping about at this minute, like so many old ravens with their mouths open, ready to pick up anything that may fall." Richard North went home, his mind full of what Mrs. Gass had said about Ellen Adair. Was she indeed looking so ill? He found her sitting in the open seat near what would be in spring the tulip bed. Mr. North had just left her and gone in. Yes: Richard saw that she looked very ill; the face was wan, the eyes were sad and weary. She was coughing as he went up to her: a short, hacking cough. Some time ago she had caught cold, and it seemed to hang about her still. "Are you well, Ellen?" he asked, as he sat down beside her. "Yes, I believe so," was her reply. "Why?" "Because I don't think you look well." A soft colour, like the pink on a sea-shell, stole over her face as Richard said this. But she kept silence. "You know, Ellen, we agreed to be as brother and sister. I wish to take care of you as such: to shield you from all ill as far as I possibly can. Are you happy here?" A moment's pause, and then Ellen took courage to say that she was not happy. "I should like to go elsewhere," she said. "Oh, Richard, if it could only be managed!" "But it cannot," he answered. "I have sufficient money, Richard." "My dear, it is not that. Of course you have sufficient. I fancy, by sundry signs, that you will be a very rich young lady," he added, slightly laughing. "But you have no near friends in England, and we could not entrust you to strangers." "If I could go for a time into some clergyman's family, or something of that sort." "Ellen!" She raised her hand from beneath the grey shawl--her favourite outdoor covering, for the shawl was warm--and passed it across her brow. In every movement there was a languor that spoke weariness of body or of spirit. "When Mr. Adair comes home, if he found you had gone into 'some clergyman's family,' what would he think and say of us, Ellen?" "I would tell him I went of my own accord." "But, my dear, you cannot be allowed to do things of your own accord, if they are not wise. I and my father are appointed to take charge of you, and you must remain with us, Ellen, until Mr. Adair returns to England."