’We shall see, we shall see,’ said the carrier. ’Girls haven’t got lawyers’ minds, and don’t follow evidence.’ ’I have undertaken to go with your father to Lawyer Physick at Okehampton,’ said Taverner Langford, ’and to help him to have his right examined.’ ’Nothing can come of it but heart-breakings,’ sighed Honor; ’father will slip certainties to seize shadows.’ ’I have nothing to lose,’ said Oliver, ’and much to gain.’ Honor knew it was in vain to attempt to disabuse him of his cherished delusion. She so far shared his views as to believe that the family had gentle blood in their veins, and were descended somehow, in some vague, undefined manner, from the Luxmores of Coombe Park, through, perhaps, some younger son of a junior branch, and she liked to suppose that the beauty and superiority of manner in her brothers and sisters were due to this, but she did not share in her father’s expectations of recovering the property. Her understanding was too clear to harbour this. ’I will go back to what I asked of Mr. Langford,’ she said, after a pause. ’Will you take my brother Charles into your service, sir? He wants a firm hand over him. He is not bad at heart, but he is infirm of purpose, easily led astray. If he were here with you, he would be far from the "Ring of Bells," and his work would sever him from idle companions.’ ’So, you don’t want him to be at Chimsworthy?’ ’I do not desire to be under obligation there.’ ’You have no objection to placing yourself under obligation to me?’ Honor did not like the tone. She did not understand his returning to the same point; she turned uneasily to her father, and asked him to put in a word for poor Charles. ’Mr. Langford is more likely to grant a boon to you than to me,’ answered Oliver evasively. ’Sit down, Honor,’ he said. ’You have remained standing the whole time you have been here.’ ’I have been making a request,’ she answered. ’The request is granted. Sit down.’ She was reluctant, yet unwilling to disoblige. Oliver signed to her to take a place. She obeyed. She was uncomfortable. There was an indefinable something in the way in which the old yeoman looked at and addressed her, something equally indefinable in her father’s manner, that combined to disturb her. Mrs. Veale came in on some excuse, to ask her master a question, with her white eyelashes quivering. She cast a sidelong glance at Honor full of malice, as she entered. When she left the room she did not shut the door, and the girl saw her white face and flickering eyes turned towards her, watching her out of the darkness of the passage. She was for a moment spellbound, but recovered herself when Taverner Longford, with an impatient exclamation, slammed the door. ’I shall be glad to be rid of the old prying cat,’ he said. ’Is Mrs. Veale going to leave you?’ asked Honor. Then she caught her father and Langford exchange glances, and her brow became hot—she hardly knew wherefore.