"I dare not say yes," she whispered. "What are you afraid of?" "Of it altogether; of your friends. Captain Monk would--would--perhaps--turn me out. And there's Mrs. Carradyne!" Harry laughed. "Captain Monk can have no right to any voice in my affairs, once he throws me off; he cannot expect to have a finger in everyone's pie. As to my mother--ah, Alice, unless I am much mistaken, she will welcome you with love." Alice burst into tears: emotion was stirring her to its depths. "_Please_ to let it all be for a time," she pleaded. "If you speak it would be sure to lead to my being turned away." "I _will_ let it be for a time, my darling, so far as speaking about it goes: for more reasons than one it may be better. But you are my promised wife, Alice; always recollect that." And Mr. Harry Carradyne, bold as a soldier should be, took a few kisses from her unresisting lips to enforce his mandate. IV Some time rolled on, calling for no particular record. Mr. Hamlyn's West Indian property, which was large and lucrative, had been giving him trouble of late; at least, those who had the care of it gave it, and he was obliged to go over occasionally to see after it in person. Between times he stayed with his wife at Peacock's Range; or else she joined him in London. Their town residence was in Bryanston Square; a pretty house, but not large. It had been an unfavourable autumn; cold and wet. Snow had fallen in November, and the weather continued persistently dull and dreary. One gloomy afternoon towards the close of the year, Mrs. Hamlyn, shivering over her drawing-room fire, rang impatiently for more coal to be piled upon it. "Has Master Walter come in yet?" she asked of the footman. "No, ma'am. I saw him just now playing in front there." She went to the window. Yes, running about the paths of the Square garden was the child, attended by his nurse. He was a sturdy little fellow. His mother, wishing to make him hardy, sent him out in all weathers, and the boy throve upon it. He was three years old now, but looked older; and he was as clever and precocious as some children are at five or six. Her heart thrilled with a strange joy only at the sight of him: he was her chief happiness in life, her idol. Whether he would succeed to Leet Hall she knew not; since that one occasion, Captain Monk had said no more upon the subject, for or against it. Why need she have longed for it so fervently? to the setting at naught the express wishes of her deceased uncle and to the detriment of Harry Carradyne? It was simply covetousness. As his father's eldest son (there were no younger ones yet) the boy would inherit a fine property, a large income; but his doting mother must give him Leet Hall as well.