"Do not think about that, Jane; I have friends, and can make more. If you are able to get over this pretty easily, we need only be sorry for Mr Rathbone: it must give him great pain to think us really ungrateful. Harriet, dear, come and tell me what is the matter. What makes you cry so?" "Because you are going away, Charles; and Isabella is ill; and Jane cried so; I am sure something is the matter." "But Isabella will be better to-morrow perhaps, and Jane is not unhappy now; look at her, she is not crying now. Go and kiss her." "All will come right again soon, I dare say," said Jane. "Charles will come again some time when we are all well." "And I shall not go to-morrow now," said Charles. "I cannot leave you so full of care." "O, Charles! you will, you must go," said Jane. "You have promised, and you must go." "I could not tell when I promised, that Isabella would be ill, and you so anxious. I cannot turn my back on you at such a time." "You can do us no good, if you stay, indeed. I must be with Isabella, and Harriet and Alfred will be at school; so you would be of no use, and it would make me uncomfortable to think you were breaking your promise. O, indeed, Charles, this is mistaken kindness." Charles did not know what to think: he proposed to consult Mr Barker. "Do," said Jane, "he will tell us what is right." Charles put on his hat. "I wonder whether we shall see you again?" said Alfred. "Harriet and I are going to bed presently." Charles kissed them tenderly. "I dare say I shall see you at breakfast to-morrow," said he: "if not, you will remember all the better what I have been saying to you this evening. You will be grown and altered much before I see you again. I hope I shall be able to love you then as well as I do now, or even better." Mr Barker was much concerned to hear Charles's little tale of anxieties. He advised him, however, to adhere to his promise respecting his return to London. Charles acquiesced at once in the decision of his friend, and was relieved by the kind promises he received that his sisters should be watched over with as much care as if their brother were beside them; especially that Jane should not be allowed to try her strength too much, in case of Isabella's illness proving long or dangerous. Charles with much emotion bid farewell to his good friend, who said, "I cannot do for you what Mr Rathbone would have done: but you may depend on me as a _sure_ friend at least. I hope, for his own sake, that he will come round again: in the mean time we must be more sorry than angry." "I _was_ angry," said Charles, "but Jane made me ashamed of myself: she is as grateful to him as ever, and I will try to remember only his past generosity." "Jane is a good girl, and will be made all the better by these rubs," said Mr Barker. "However, we will smooth things for her as well as we can."