"Oh, lots of things. They keep hunters, and----" "Why, you were never on horseback in your life, Robert," laughed Jane. "You would come back with your neck broken." "I do wish you'd be quiet, Jane!" returned Robert, reddening. "I am talking to mamma, not to you. Winchcombe has invited me to spend the Christmas holidays with him down at his father's place in Yorkshire. And, mother, I want to go; and I want you to promise that I shall not return to school when the holidays are over. I will do anything else that you choose to put me to. I'll learn to be a man of business, or I'll go into an office, or I'd be apprenticed to a doctor--anything you like, rather than stop at these everlasting school-books. I am _sick_ of them." "Robert, you take my breath away!" uttered Mrs. Tait. "I have no interest anywhere. I could not get you into any of these places." "I dare say Mr. Halliburton could. He knows lots of people. Jane, you talk to him: he'll do anything for you." There ensued, I say, much discussion about Robert. But it is not with Robert Tait that our story has to do; and only a few words need be given to him here and there. It appeared to them all that it would be inexpedient for him to continue at school; both with regard to his own wishes and to his prospects. He was allowed to pay the visit with his schoolfellow, and (as he came back with neck unbroken) Mr. Halliburton succeeded in placing him in a large wholesale warehouse. Robert appeared to like it very much at first, and always came home to spend Sunday with them. "He may rise in time to be one of the first mercantile men in London," observed Mr. Halliburton to his wife; "one of our merchant-princes, as my uncle used to say by me, if only----" "If what? Why do you hesitate?" she asked. "If he will only persevere, I was going to say. But, Jane, I fear perseverance is a quality that Robert does not possess." Of course all that had to be proved. It lay in the future. CHAPTER V. MARGARET. From two to three years passed away, and the Midsummer holidays were approaching. Margaret was expected as usual for them, and Jane, delighted to receive her, went about her glad preparations. Margaret would not return to the school, in which she had been a paid teacher for the last year; but was to enter a family as governess. For one efficient, well-educated, accomplished governess to be met with in those days, scores may be counted now--or who profess to be so; and Margaret Tait, though barely nineteen, anticipated a salary of seventy or eighty guineas a year. A warm, bright day in June, that on which Mr. Halliburton went to receive Margaret. The coach brought her to its resting-place, the "Bull and Mouth," in St. Martin's-le-Grand, and Mr. Halliburton reached the inn as St. Paul's clock was striking midday. One minute more, and the coach drove in.