“They won’t sell mine, because my brother will be by my bedside,” said Mouse with a sunny yet plaintive smile in her forget-me-not like eyes. “Don’t trust too much to that, my dear; I am mortal, and a good many years older than you,” he answered gravely as he folded up the Bond Street tradesmen’s threatening letter and put it in his coat pocket. “You had better write a check for me, Ronald, indeed,” said his sister coaxingly; “it will look odd if you pay this, or if your people pay it, and I could do a great deal with all that money.” “You would do everything except pay the account! I don’t think you would do much with the riches of all the world except run through them,” said Hurstmanceaux curtly, and taking no notice of the appeal. Past experience had taught him that money which passed through his sister’s fingers had a knack of never reaching its destination. “I won’t compromise you,” he added; “don’t be afraid, and I shall tell them that they have lost your custom.” “You need not say that,” said Mouse uneasily; she was very fond of this particular Bond Street shop, and what was the use of paying an account if you did not avail yourself of the advantage so gained by opening another one instantly? “I certainly shall say it,” said Hurstmanceaux decidedly; and he once more left the room. Mouse looked after him with regret and uneasiness; regret that she had turned his generous impulse to such small account, and uneasiness lest he should suspect more of her affairs than it would be well for him to learn. “He is a good fellow sometimes, but so stiff-necked and mule-headed,” she thought, as she hastily calculated in her rapidly working brain how much percentage she might have got off the Bond Street account if she had dealt with the matter herself. She was extravagant, but she was very keen about money at the same time, at once prodigal and parsimonious, which is a more general combination than most people suppose. Hurstmanceaux looked back at her rather wistfully from between the cream-colored, rose-embroidered curtains of the doorway. It was on his lips to ask her not to pursue her patronage of Harrenden House; but as he had just promised to do her a service he could not seem to dictate to her an obedience as a return payment to him. He went away in silence. “Besides, whatever she were to promise she would always do as she liked,” he reflected: previous experiences having told him that neither threats nor persuasions ever had the slightest effect upon his sister’s actions.