There was another pause, and the stranger could easily perceive that, facile as Harry was elsewhere, he liked to reign at home, and did not very readily forgive any resistance to his will. He had, indeed, been very querulous and unreasonable this morning, and this was only the climax of a series of petty selfishnesses which had exhausted Martha’s powers of long-suffering. “Shall we see you soon in Glasgow again,” asked Harry, at length, turning once more to Cuthbert. “In a few weeks, perhaps; I may have some business,” said Cuthbert, with embarrassment. “You will be strong again then, I hope. My uncle commissions me to say that you must take full time to recover, and not hurry to the office too soon.” “Mr. Buchanan is always very kind,” said Agnes. “Is he?” said Cuthbert, smiling, “scarcely kind enough, I am disposed to think; but I believe it is not the inclination that is defective in my uncle. These trammels of ordinary usage--doing as other people do--have a great effect upon men occupied as he is. He does not take time to judge for himself, and exercise his own generosity and justice.” Cuthbert concluded in some haste. Quite consistent as this apology was with his own previous thoughts, it suddenly occurred to him that it was quite irrelevant and unnecessary here. “Mr. Buchanan has done perfect justice to Harry, I fancy,” said Martha Muir, raising her thin figure from its habitual stoop, and speaking in a tone of cold _hauteur_, which, like the passion, revealed a new phase of her character to Cuthbert, who watched her with interest; “and as for generosity, Mr. Charteris, your uncle seems by no means deficient where there is any scope for that. I see his name often in the papers. You judge Mr. Buchanan hardly.” Cuthbert comprehended, and was silent. Between the rich man’s indifference and the poor man’s pride it was difficult to steer; and Richard and Alick Buchanan were not more haughtily offended at the accusation of treating their clerks unfairly than was Harry Muir’s sister at the suggestion that his employer’s generosity could reach him. “This poor leg of mine is nearly a month old now,” said Harry, “and except some grave visits from Gilchrist, no one has ever taken the trouble to inquire for me. I suppose your cousins are more pleasantly occupied.” “I rather think Dick is afraid,” said Cuthbert. He was singularly unfortunate in his choice of subjects. A little red spot began to burn on Harry’s cheek; poor fellow, he wanted to be angry. “Afraid!” “I mean, they would rather not encounter the ladies till you are quite recovered. Persuading you to go with them, you know, burdens their conscience, because it exposed you to this accident. Not, of course, that any one was to blame,” said Cuthbert, hurriedly, and with some confusion. “Their conscience is over scrupulous,” said Harry, looking round him with a smile of defiance. “I went with them for my own pleasure; so far as there is any blame it is entirely mine.”