'Father!' with her voice trembling, 'I assure you he doesn't--I mean he always goes to St. Michael's, unless he has anything particular to say to me.' 'Oh yes, I understand,' and Mr. Egremont indulged in a hearty laugh, which almost drove poor Nuttie beside herself. 'Indeed--indeed,' she stammered, in her confusion and suppressed wrath; 'it is nothing of that sort. He is a regular old bachelor--he always was.' 'At what age do men become old bachelors? For he seems to me about the age of poor Clarry, whom you seem to view as a bugbear.' 'I wish you would not think of such things, father; I have not the slightest intention of leaving you and dear little Wynnie! Nothing should tempt me!' 'Nothing? Hein! Then you may as well be on your guard, Miss Egremont, or we shall have pleadings that you have encouraged them--church and world--or both, maybe. You pious folk take your little diversions and flirtations just like your poor sisters whom you shake your heads at, never guessing how Gregorio and I have looked out at you and your adopted uncle parading the street.' 'I wish Gregorio would mind his own business, and not put such things in your head!' burst out Nuttie. At which Mr. Egremont laughed longer and louder than ever. Poor Nuttie! It was terrible discomfiture, not only for the moment, but a notion had been planted in her mind that seemed cruel, almost profane, and yet which would not be dismissed, and made her heart leap with strange bounds at the wild thought, 'Could it be true?' then sink again with shame at her own presumptuous folly in entertaining such a thought for a moment. Yet whenever she actually encountered Mr. Dutton her habitual comfort and reliance on him revived, and dispelled all the embarrassment which at other times she expected to feel in his presence. CHAPTER XXXI. SPES NON FRACTA. Summer had quite set in before Mr. Egremont was able to go out for a drive, and then he was ordered to Buxton. Nuttie only once saw her cousins before leaving town, for their little boy fulfilled the nursery superstition by whooping till May; and all intercourse was prohibited, till he had ceased for a whole week to utter a suspicious sound. Mr. Dutton had insisted on the family spending a fortnight at Springfield House for change of air, and it was there that Nuttie was permitted to see them, though the children were still forbidden to meet. Annaple looked very thin, but rattled as merrily as ever. 'No one could guess,' she said, 'what a delight it was not to know what one was to have for dinner?' 'To do more than know, I am afraid,' said Ursula. 'Well, next to the delight of knowing nothing at all about it--and even that is only good for a holiday--is the delight of seeing a pudding come out smooth and comfortable and unbroken from its basin. "Something attempted, something done," you know. It is quite as good a work of art as a water-coloured drawing.' 'Only not quite so permanent.'