‘What is that about old Loseby?’ said the lawyer, coming into the room. He was carrying a portfolio in his hands, which, let us hope, he had honestly gone to look for when he left them. Anyhow he carried it ostentatiously as if this had been his natural object in his absence. But the others were too much excited to notice his portfolio or his severely business air. At least Heathcote was excited, who felt that he had evidently made a fool of himself, and had given vent to a bit of ridiculous emotion, quite uncalled for, without any object, and originating he could not tell how. What was the meaning of it, he would have asked himself, but that the fumes of his own words had got into his head. He turned away, quite beyond his own control, when the lawyer appeared, his heart beating, his blood coursing through his veins. How had all this tempest got up in an instant? Did it come from nothing, and mean nothing? or had it been there within him, lying quiescent all this time. He could not answer the question, nor, indeed, for that matter, did he ask it, being much too fully occupied for the moment with the commotion which had thus suddenly got up like the boiling of a volcano within him, without any will of his own. And Anne was too much bewildered, too much astonished to say anything. She could not believe her own ears. It seemed to her that her senses must be playing her false, that she could not be seeing aright or hearing aright--or else what did it mean? Mr. Loseby glided in between them with his portfolio, feeling sure they would remark his little artifice and understand his stratagem; but he had succeeded in that stratagem so much better than he thought, that they paid no attention to him at all. ‘What are you saying about old Loseby?’ he asked. ‘It is not civil in the first place, Mr. Heathcote, to call your family man of business old. It is a contumelious expression. I am not sure that it is not actionable. That reminds me that I have never had anything to do with your branch of the family--which, no doubt, is the reason why you take this liberty. I am on the other side----’ ‘Do me this service, then, at once,’ said Heathcote, coming back from that agitated little walk with which a man who has been committing himself and showing uncalled-for emotion so often relieves his feelings. ‘Persuade my cousins to gratify me by staying at Mount. I have clearly told you I should not know what to do with it. If they will stay nothing need be changed.’ ‘It is a very good idea,’ said Mr. Loseby. ‘I think an excellent idea. They will pay you a rent for it which will be reasonable, which will not be exorbitant.’ ‘They shall do nothing of the sort,’ cried Heathcote: ‘rent--between me and----’ ‘Yes, between you and Mrs. Mountford, the most reasonable proposal in the world. It is really a thing to be taking into your full consideration, Anne. Of course you must live somewhere. And there is no place you would like so well.’