"Indeed I am glad to see you," said Sara, simply. "I am doubly glad, for I feel almost ashamed to confess I was getting too nervous to be alone. My aunt is out; she went to the Abbey as soon as dinner was over. I am glad to see you thus early," she added, "because I have a word to say to you from--from papa." "Yes," said Oswald, lifting his head with slight eagerness, an unusual thing for him to do. "In the letter he wrote to you, and which I sent--the letter you received," she continued, looking at him and pausing. "Yes?" "He spoke of Mrs. Cray's money in it, as he told me. He wished you to interest yourself and see that it was settled upon her. When he wrote that letter he was almost past exertion, and had to conclude it abruptly, not having said so much as he wished to say. Therefore he enjoined me to urge it upon you from him. He thought--I believe he thought that Mark Cray was inclined to be careless, and that the money might be wasted unless some one interfered. That was all." "I shall speak to Mark. Most certainly I will urge the settlement of the money on his wife, should there be occasion for it; but I imagine Mark will naturally so settle it without any urging. It is quite incumbent on him to do so, both as a matter of prudence and that it is his wife's money, not his." "I don't think Mark has much notion of prudence," she rejoined. "I don't think he has, in a general way. But the most careless would surely act in accordance with its dictates in a case like this. I am going to tie Abbey presently." "I fancy that papa thought--or wished--that you would be one of the trustees, should trustees be required." "I should have no objection," said Oswald, after a pause. "But--to go to another subject, if you can bear me to touch upon it--was not Dr. Davenal's death sudden at the last?" "Quite at the last it was. He had some days of dangerous illness, and he rallied from it, as we all supposed. It was thought he was out of danger, and he sat up: he sat up for several hours--and died." She spoke the words quietly, almost as she might have told of the death of one not related to her, her hands clasped on her lap, her face a little bent, her eyelids drooping. But Oswald Cray saw that it was the calmness that proceeds from that stern schooling of the heart which can only be enforced by those heavy-laden with hopeless pain. "He died sitting up?" "Yes. It was getting late, but he would not return to bed. He had been talking to me about many things; I was on a low seat, my head leaning against him. He died with his arm round me." "What a trial! What a shock it must have been!" "I had no idea he was dead. He ceased talking, and I remained quiet, not to disturb him. My aunt Bettina came in, and saw what had happened." He scarcely knew what to say in answer. All comments at such a time are so grievously inadequate. He murmured some words of pity for the fate of Dr. Davenal, of compassion for her.