“He has been very kind to Arthur. I don’t know if you call that an idle friendship.” “My dear cousin Lucy, I don’t want to say a word that is disagreeable to you. If you think Durant a better friend for Arthur than I am--” “I was not saying what I thought, or giving any opinion about best or better. I was only speaking of the fact.” “Well, so be it,” he said with a sigh; “but, at all events, you will not deny that there are few people to whom Arthur and his wife can be more important in the future. We are likely to live our lives out side by side.” “You mean after papa--” “Now you are angry with me again! It may be years and years hence, and I hope it will; but in the course of nature, and my uncle would be the first to wish it, Arthur will succeed him. We are both a great deal younger than Sir John; and I suppose I am here for life--unless you are unkind to me, Lucy, and make me indifferent to everything,” he said, lowering his voice. She took no notice of this, unless by quickening her pace, and insensibly withdrawing a little further from his side. They were walking down together to the village, where Lucy had her favourite old women to see after her return home. She had no excuse for refusing her cousin’s escort, and why should she refuse it? He was very nice; there was nothing in him that any lady could object to. He was her own near relative, and their way was the same as far as the village, and she liked him well enough. Why had everybody at the Hall this unexpressed, incipient distrust of Hubert Curtis? Lucy could not tell; and perhaps it was not necessary to have such a feeling to explain her little proud movement aside, her slight withdrawal when he spoke in this tone of subdued tenderness. She did not choose that her cousin should be tender to her, and therefore it was quite natural that she should withdraw. “I suppose you are right,” she said. “Of course, you are a great deal younger than papa; but it gives one a shock to think what may happen when he--I prefer, for my part, not to think of it. Yes,” Lucy continued, with that sudden inconsistency which she had from her mother; “of course, Arthur and his wife will be of importance to you when we are all away from the Hall; and you have a right to hear all I can tell you. Well, Cousin Bertie--” “May I not protest against this?” he said. “You are not kind to me, Lucy. What an air of selfish, interested, business-like curiosity you put upon the simple sentiment I expressed!” At this Lucy blushed once more; for to be thought capable of imputing base motives, was not that as bad as to be base one’s self? “I beg your pardon,” she said; “perhaps I am twisted a little--the wrong way. How can one help that, when everything has gone so contrary? Well, I will tell you all I know, and you must forgive me if I was disagreeable.” “You are never disagreeable,” he said, in again that objectionable tone, and with a world of objectionable meaning, “to _me_.”