different from other girls; and he wondered in himself what kind of a life hers would be. Would she--after all, that was the first question--remain in Arden when Gussy came as its mistress?--if Gussy ever came. Would she find it possible to bend her spirit to that? Would she marry, impatient of this first contradiction of her supremacy?--and which would she choose if she married? All these questions passed through Edgar’s mind, gravely at first, lightly afterwards, as the immediate impression of her seriousness died away. Then he looked at all the things on the table--his father’s seal, the paper in the blotting-book, with its crest and motto. How well he remembered the few curt letters he had received on that paper, bidding him “come home on Friday next to spend a week or a fortnight,” as the case might be--very curt and unyielding they had been, with no softening use of his name, no “dear Edgar,” or “dear boy,” but only the command, whatever it was. It was not wonderful that he had little reverence, little admiration, for his father’s memory. His face grew sterner and paler as he turned over those relics of the dead man, which moved Clare only to tenderest memories. Twenty years of neglect, of injury, of unkindness came before him, all culminating in that one look of intense hatred which he remembered so well--the look which made it apparent to him that his father--his father!--would have been glad had he died. Such thoughts had been banished from Edgar’s breast for a long time. He had dismissed them by a vigorous effort of will when he entered upon his life at Arden; it was but those signs and tokens of the past that brought them back, and again he made an effort to begin his task, though with so little relish for it. If it was anything affecting the Squire, Edgar felt he was not able to approach it calmly. A certain impatience, a certain disgust, came into his mind at the thought. To please Clare--that was a different matter. He opened the enclosure slowly and with reluctance, and once more turned over in his hand the inner packet, still sealed up, which had the appearance of having been thrown into the fire, and hastily snatched out again. The parcel was singed and torn, and one of the seals had run into a great blotch of wax, obliterating all impression. As he held it in his hand he felt the place where the envelope was torn across, and remembered dimly that his sister had attributed her interest in it to the words she had read through this tear. What were they? he wondered. He turned the packet round and laid it on the table, with the torn part uppermost. It was his father’s handwriting that appeared below, a writing somewhat difficult to read. He studied it, read it, lifted it nearer to his eyes--asked himself, “What does it mean?”--then he held it up to the light and read it over once more. What did it mean? A certain blank seemed to take possession of all his faculties--he wondered vaguely--the powers of his mind seemed