For several weeks it seemed as if Mrs. Sundon’s prognostications were to prove correct. It was not that Master Charles intermitted his visits to Summerhill, and he was even punctilious in his continued offers of service to the ladies; but somehow there was a change in the nature of the intercourse, and there was a dryness approaching to sullenness in the young gentleman’s manner to Mrs. Sundon. But at the close of these weeks Master Charles thought better of it, and came looking shame-faced, yet, but frank and ingenuous as ever, and told Mrs. Sundon, “I have been compelled to be a little more particular in my company since the promise you made me give you, which, of course, I was resolved to keep, come what like of it. But I have reaped the benefit of it already, I have discovered that there are plenty of gentlemen of parts and spirit, good judges of horse-flesh besides, who will not play at higher than half-crown points, and will not lay a wager on a horse, or a dog, unless it be so trifling a one that they have no anxiety about it, and have all their minds to bestow on their proper affairs. They are ready to welcome me to their company when they see that I prefer it. You were quite right, Mrs. Sundon, I add my poor testimony to my promise.” The dryness and sullenness disappeared from that day. Lady Bell was jubilant at the issue, and the restoration of their comrade, and disposed to crow over Mrs. Sundon. “Oh! he is a good sort, as Miss Kingscote says,” confessed the authority, “he is more generous than his brethren. I am thankful to have been of use to him.” This was all that Mrs. Sundon said to Lady Bell, but in her own mind she reflected with apparent incoherence, “I could wish that he had been higher in rank, and Miss Kingscote more presentable. I don’t think that his being a little countrified would have mattered to her else.” As a supplement to all other interests and entertainments, Mrs. Sundon and Lady Bell had little Caro to play with—to plan for with the deepest seriousness, to build castles in the air for with the highest hopefulness. But Mrs. Sundon was different from many mothers. Mrs. Sundon not only did not expect Lady Bell to be engrossed with her little daughter, Mrs. Sundon herself would have thought it exceedingly ill-judged and ill-bred to bring forward the child, and cause her to fill the first place in the circle, forcing every other interest and satisfaction to give way to Caro’s interest and satisfaction. No, little Caro, while she was dearly prized and petted, was kept quite in her proper and purely subordinate sphere, and that under wholesome discipline, and was decidedly a happier as well as a more modest and artless child then and afterwards in consequence of her mother’s public spirit in combination with her common sense.