"Not in words. But she sees how much I and Daisy are together, and she allows it. _That_ will be all right, Uncle Hugh." "Daisy? Let me see? Oh, that is the young one: she is a nice little girl. I cannot say I like the elder. But----" "But what, sir?" "You are by nature over-sanguine, Frank; and I cannot help thinking that you are so in this. Rely upon it, there is some mistake here. Mrs. St. Clare is a proud, haughty woman, remarkably alive, unless I am in error, to self-interest. She would not be likely to give a daughter to one whose prospects are so uncertain as yours." "But I am wishing to make my prospects more certain, you see, uncle. And I can assure you she approves of me for Daisy." "Well, well; if so, I am glad to hear it. Nevertheless it surprises me. I should have supposed she would look higher for suitors for her daughters. The little girl is a nice girl, I say, Frank, and you have my best wishes." "Thank you, Uncle Hugh," warmly repeated Frank, rising, his face flushing with pleasure as he met the doctor's hand. "Of course you understand that it must not yet be talked of: I must first of all speak to Mrs. St. Clare." "I shall not be likely to talk of it," replied Dr. Raynor. CHAPTER X. MAJOR AND MRS. RAYNOR. The windows of Spring Lawn stood open to the afternoon sun. It was a small, pretty white house, half cottage, half villa, situated about three miles from Bath. A latticed portico, over which crept the white clematis, led into a miniature hall: Major Raynor could just turn round in it. On either side was a small sitting-room, the dining-room on the left, the drawing-room on the right. The scrambling midday dinner was over. Somehow all the meals seemed to be scrambling at the major's, from the utter want of order, and of proper attendance. Only two servants were kept, a cook and a nurse: and _they_ could not always get their wages paid. When Edina was there, she strove to bring a little comfort out of the chaos: but that was only a chance event; a brief and rare occasion, occurring at long intervals in life. Some wine stood on the old table-cover, with a plate of biscuits. On one side of the table sat the major; a tall and very portly man, with a bald head and a white moustache, looking every day of his nine and-sixty years. He had been getting on for fifty when he married his young wife; who was not quite eight-and-thirty yet: a delicate, fragile-looking woman, with a small fair face and gentle voice, mild blue eyes, a pink colour, and thin light brown hair quietly braided back from it. Mrs. Raynor looked what she was: a gentle, yielding, amiable, helpless woman; one who could never be strong-minded in any emergency whatever, but somehow one to be loved at first sight.