“How would you like it if they invited you to stay with them while I was away?” he asked. “Hugh could play with his little cousin, and I’m sure Pollie could make herself useful, seeing what hot water they’re always in with their servants. This house would cost little shut up, and you could keep an eye on it, or even get it let as it stands for a few months out of the twelve.” “No, Charlie,” said Lucy. There was an almost fierce decision in her voice. “No, I can bear to miss you, if I am in my own place, our place, and can be by myself when I choose, and am doing all I can to serve our future. I could not bear to sit down at dinner-parties, and to have to dress of an evening, and to talk small talk in the drawing-room. The Brands mean to be kind of course,” she added hastily; “but they like to have crowds of people about, and I don’t. Florence had thirty-five callers at her last weekly ‘afternoon’; while I’m one of those who think that ‘a world in purchase of one friend to gain.’ No, Charlie, don’t try to take care of me in these ways. Trust me with myself. I know what is good for me. There are some matters men never quite understand.” “Well, if you are to take your own ways, you must be careful that they succeed,” said her husband. “One comfort is, you have Pollie, and can trust and depend on her. Those cheeks of yours are thin and pale. I must find round roses on them when I come back—if I go! Oh, Lucy, why did you make these plans, and why did Alick Grant write that letter? We should have gone on so happily as we are, and I should have picked up strength gradually. Why has this come into our heads?” “I think because it is the will of God that you should go,” answered Lucy with sweet reverence. “I thought so all the while when it was only my own plans, which were working out so well. I think so more than ever now, Charlie, when I find that all the time you, as it were, were holding the other end of the same stick.” “Shall we put the matter to one more test?” said Charlie. “Shall I write to Grant asking when he sails and if he will take me for the year at one hundred pounds, telling him that if he can, and if I can be ready by his date, I will entertain the idea.” “You can be ready by any date if Dr. Ivery thinks you are strong enough,” said Lucy, “and we could afford more than one hundred. If this is the path of Providence, Charlie, ought we to be turned aside by these things?” “Such a letter will not bind me either way,” returned her husband, “it is purely tentative; and yet if the date and the terms prove suitable, the leading will seem the clearer. I will write at once, and until we get Grant’s answer, we will not say a word on the matter to anybody.” The epistle was soon written, and Lucy herself hurried on her bonnet and ran with it to the post, lest Pollie should not be quick enough to catch the night mail for the north.