"Benja's nurse. She took to him when my poor Caroline died. My present wife does not seem strong; at least she has had one or two serious illnesses lately; and Pym says the care of the two boys is more than I ought to put upon her. Perhaps it would be." "Why not at once leave Benja under another guardianship?" "I should not like to do so. The world would regard it as a slight, a tacit want of confidence in my wife: and besides, in that case I should be divided as to whether to leave the Hall as a present residence to her or to Benja. I--mark me, Mr. St. John--I place full reliance upon my wife; I believe she will do her duty by Benja, and make him happy; and in that case there is no harm done. I am only providing for a contingency." "I see. Well, I accept the charge, George, though it might be well that you should entrust it to a more active man." "No, no; you and you only." They continued talking together for the brief space George St. John had allotted for his stay. Little more was said on the one subject, for George quitted it somewhat abruptly, and they had other topics in common; family matters, news on either side, as is the case when relatives meet after a prolonged separation. At the appointed time he was driven back to Lexington in Mr. St. John's carriage, took the return train, and reached Alnwick about six in the evening. His wife had sent the close carriage for him, fearing the night air. George St. John directed the coachman to drive round by Mr. Drake, the lawyer's; and when that gentleman came out to him he asked him to step up to the Hall on the morrow, on a little matter of business relative to an alteration in his recently-made will. But Mr. St. John of Castle Wafer, pondering on these matters after his relative's departure, remained puzzled, and could by no means arrive at a satisfactory conclusion as to whether there was danger that Mrs. Carleton St. John might be cruel to Benja, after the fashion of the vindictive uncle of the "Babes in the Wood," or whether it was feared that she would kill him with kindness. CHAPTER IX. CHANGES AT ALNWICK. On a charming summer day in that favourite room whose windows overlooked the broad lands of Alnwick, sat Mrs. Carleton St. John in widow's weeds. Opposite to her, in mourning also, her travelling shawl unpinned and slipping from her slim, falling shoulders, her bonnet dusty, was Mrs. Darling, not five minutes arrived. Changes had come to Alnwick, as these signs betrayed. Its master, so much loved and respected during life, was no more. In the month of May the deceitful, as poets have it, the crisis came for George Carleton St. John, and the Hall passed to another owner--the little boy too young to be conscious of his full loss, and whose chief idea connected with it was the black attire with which officious attendants hastened to invest him.