"Do they? I am not sure that I care. Yes; perhaps I do. I should like to give a big dinner to the poor, and to have all our friends here as well. We have talked it over many a time. But whether padre would stand the excitement—! Well, December is nearly a month away still. Nigel, do you know at all the amount that is to come to me? I have never been told definitely. Padre hates business talk." "About forty thousand, I believe." "So much! I thought it was twenty or thirty thousand." "It was to be as much as forty by this time, certainly,—by the time you are of age." "I believe I heard—part was to accumulate at compound interest. But padre was to use some of the interest." "Yes; through your minority. That was the arrangement made by your father." "Then my coming of age will be a loss to him. Is that why he dislikes any mention of it?" "I hope not!" "Why? People don't like losing part of the income they are accustomed to. But of course I shall let him have any amount still that he wants, only keeping enough for my own clothes. What do I want with more?" "When you set up a separate establishment—" "Nonsense. As if—" "At all events, don't pledge yourself. Promise nothing till you see your way." She was conscious of his new manliness, of the change from boy to man. He was only a year older than herself; and twelve months earlier the difference had seemed to be on the other side. Now he had outstripped her; and with a sense of pleasure she knew that she might begin to look up to him, to appeal to his judgment. But nobody could have guessed those thoughts to be passing through Fulvia's mind, as she stood near the fire, winding a ball of worsted, while the light fell on her reddish, fluffy hair and plain though piquant face. "You to advise that?" "Why not?" "I thought—well, you might yourselves be the losers. Why should I not hand it all over to padre as it comes in? I don't know what on earth to do with such a lot of money." "You can't hand over the responsibility." "No, perhaps not. I wish one could transfer responsibilities sometimes; but I don't see after all why one should not—in a sense. I mean, that might be the right use for the money; and then the question of spending would come upon padre." She swept up some remnants of patchwork, Daisy's leavings, from a side-table, put straight a few books, closed the open piano, and came back to the rug. Nigel's face had fallen again into a thoughtful set. Fulvia, gave him a good look unobserved, for he was gazing into the fire. "I see you haven't lost your old trick of day-dreams. Has anything teased you at the Rectory? Ethel—did you see Ethel?"