"Why should not you go to the University, and carry out the old programme? You are fitted for the Bar. Uncle Arthur always said so. Even if you should marry soon, that would be no real hindrance; only it would have to be Cambridge—not Oxford. "I have set my heart upon this, and I think you will not disappoint me. Madre and the girls are to come and live with me; and Daisy and I will make ourselves useful to Mr. Elvey in the parish. Then, if you like to let No. 9, furnished, that would be a little addition to your income. "Write just one line to say that you will not disappoint your affectionate sister, "FULVIA." The "one line" came by return of post. "MY DEAR FULVIA,—Words can never say what I owe to you. It seems that you are determined to heap coals of fire upon our heads,—upon mine especially. "You shall have your will. I can only submit to your generosity. I would say much more if I knew how to say it; but perhaps you will understand.—Ever your affectionate and grateful N. B." * * * * * * * Three months ended, the travellers returned. It was a drizzling autumn afternoon, much like that on which Nigel had come home from his year of travel. As the train stopped, Nigel's face appeared. Fulvia had known that it must be so, and she had schooled herself to meet him composedly. One throb her heart gave, but she smiled a quiet greeting. Ethel was very still. Nigel's eyes went to her face in a swift flash. "How many trunks?" he asked. "Pollard is there. Daisy and I will see that he has them all right," said Fulvia, turning away. Nigel was left by Ethel's side, for the moment practically alone with her. Nobody else was near, for few people had come by this train. It was growing very dusk. He took her hand into his warm clasp. "Ethel, are you well again?" "Oh, quite. And Fulvia has been so good to me,—so very good and loving." "I don't wonder," he said involuntarily, yet the next moment he did wonder, knowing all. But he could hardly think of even Fulvia yet, standing by Ethel, knowing that at last she might be his own. "Just one look!" he pleaded. The blue eyes glanced up, arch and sweet. "It is your own self," he said. He had waited patiently all these weeks, but now he felt that he could wait no longer. Another hour of uncertainty would be unbearable. Confident as he might feel at times, he had never really put the question to her; and it broke from him in this moment of meeting. "Ethel, tell me!" he said huskily. "There is nothing now to keep us apart. Tell me—dearest—will you have me?" "Yes!" she whispered. The same brief answer which she had given once before, on a certain wintry afternoon, to a somewhat different question of his; and it meant a plenitude of trust and joy.