'Ah, Clara! I fear that much comfort went away with dear granny. I think he is overtasking himself at the school; and three children within a year may well make a man anxious and oppressed.' 'And I have vexed and disappointed him more!' exclaimed she. 'No wonder he was angry, and ready to impute anything! But he will believe me, he will forgive me, he will take me home.' 'It is my belief,' said Fitzjocelyn, in his peculiar way, 'that the worst injury you could do to James would be to give way to the spirit that has possessed him.' 'But, Louis,' cried Clara, wildly astonished, 'I must go; I can't have Jem saying these things of me.' 'His saying them does not make them true.' 'He is my brother. He has the only right to me. If I must choose between him and my uncle, he must be mine--mine.' 'You have not to choose between him and your uncle. You have to choose between right and wrong, between his frenzy and his true good.' 'My brother! my brother! I go with my brother!' was still her vehement cry. Without listening to her cousin's last words, she made a gesture to put him aside, and rose to hurry to her brother. But Louis stood before her, and spoke gravely. 'Very well. Yield yourself to his management. Go back to be another burden upon a household, poor enough already to sour him with cares. Let him tell your uncle that both his brother's children loathe the fruit of the self-sacrifice of a lifetime. Transgress your grandmother's wishes; condemn that poor man to a desolate, objectless, covetous old age; make the breach irreconcilable for ever; and will James be the better or the happier for your allowing his evil temper the full swing?' Clara wrung her hands. 'My uncle! Yes, what shall I do with my uncle? If I could only have them both?' 'This way you would have neither. Keep the straight path, and you may end in having both.' 'Straight--I don't know what straight is! It must be right to cling to my own brother in his noble poverty. Oh! that he should imagine me caring for this horrid, horrid state and grandeur!'