“I know nothing of the business, but Mr Lewis’s letter will explain it,” said the messenger, who was civil but not respectful; and the anxious mistress of the house hastened in with great apprehension and perplexity to open the letter and see what this explanation was. It was not a very satisfactory one. With a friendly spirit, yet with a most cautious and lawyer-like regard to the interest of his immediate client, Mr Lewis, the same person who had been intrusted with the will of old Miss Bridget, and who was Lord Winterbourne’s solicitor, announced the intention of his principal to “resume possession” of Miss Bridget’s little house. “You will remember,” wrote the lawyer, “that I did not fail to point out to you at the time the insecure nature of the tenure by which this little property was held. Granted, as I believe it was, as a gift simply for the lifetime of Miss Bridget Atheling, she had, in fact, no right to bequeath it to any one, and so much of her will as relates to this is null and void. I am informed that there are documents in existence proving this fact beyond the possibility of dispute, and that any resistance would be entirely vain. As a friend, I should advise you not to attempt it; the property is actually of very small value, and though I speak against the interest of my profession, I think it right to warn you against entering upon an expensive lawsuit with a man like Lord Winterbourne, to whom money is no consideration. For the sake of your family, I appeal to you whether it would not be better, though at a sacrifice of feeling, to give up without resistance the old house, which is of very little value to any one, if it were not for my lord’s whim of having no small proprietors in his neighbourhood. I should be sorry that he was made acquainted with this communication. I write to you merely from private feelings, as an old friend.” Mrs Atheling rose from her seat hastily, holding the papers in her hand. “Resist him!” she exclaimed--“yes, certainly, to the very last;” but at that moment there came in at the half-open door a sound of childish riot, exuberant and unrestrained, which arrested the mother’s words, and subdued her like a spell. Bell and Beau, rather neglected and thrown into the shade for the first time in their lives, were indemnifying themselves in the kitchen, where they reigned over Hannah with the most absolute and unhesitating mastery. Mamma fell back again into her seat, silent, pale, and with pain and terror in her face. Was this the first beginning of the blight of the Evil Eye?