“But haven’t I told you over and over again that you have only to make-up to—but there, I haven’t told you that Jos was with him, and I will say this for her, that she looked as ashamed for him as I am sure I was! I declare I was sorry for the girl and she not daring to put in a word—such an old bear as he is to her!” “Poor Jos!” Arthur said. “She has not a very bright life of it. But this does not interest Clement, and we’re keeping him.” The young man had indeed made more than one attempt to take leave, but every time he had moved Mrs. Bourdillon had either ignored him, or by a stately gesture had claimed his silence. He rose now. “I dare say you know my cousin?” Arthur said. “I’ve seen her,” Clement answered; and his mind went back to the only occasion on which he had remarked Miss Griffin. It had been at the last Race Ball at Aldersbury that he had noticed her—a gentle, sweet-faced girl, plainly and even dowdily dressed, and so closely guarded by her proud old dragon of a father that, warned by the fate of others and aware that his name was not likely to find favor with the Squire, he had shrunk from seeking an introduction. But he had noticed that she sat out more than she danced; sat, indeed, in a kind of isolation, fenced in by the old man, and regarded with glances of half-scornful pity by girls more smartly dressed. He had had time to watch her, for he also, though for different reasons, had been a little without the pale, and he had found her face attractive. He had imagined how differently she would look were she suitably dressed. “Yes,” he continued, recalling it, “she was at the last Race Ball, I think.” “And a mighty poor time she had of it,” Arthur answered, half carelessly, half contemptuously. “Poor Jos! She hasn’t at any time much of a life with my beauty of an uncle. Twopence to get and a penny to spend!” Mrs. Bourdillon protested. “I do wish you would not talk of your cousin like that,” she said. “You know that she’s your uncle’s heiress, and if you only——” Arthur cut her short. “There! There! You don’t remember, mother, that Clement has seven miles to ride before his supper. Let him go now! He’ll be late enough.” That was the end, and the two young men went out together. When Arthur returned, the tea had been removed and his mother was seated at her tambour work. He took his stand before the fire. “Confounded old screw!” he fumed. “Thirty pounds a year? And he’s three thousand, if he’s a penny! And more likely four!” “Well, it may be yours some day,” with a sniff. “I’m sure Jos is ready enough.” “She’ll have to do as he tells her.” “But Garth must be hers.”