‘Oh, the boys! They were more happy than words could say. I think you measure everything by the boys.’ ‘Not everything,’ she said with a sigh; and, taking up her candle, she followed her friend upstairs. The house had fallen into perfect quiet. There was not a sound in all the upper part; a drowsy stillness was in the broad staircase, still dimly lighted, and the corridor above; only a distant echo from below, from the regions which were half underground--a muffled sound of laughter and voices--showed that the servants were still carrying on the festivity. Mrs. Blencarrow said good-night at the door of her friend’s room, and went on to her own, which was at the further end of the long gallery. She left her candle upon a small table outside, where it burned on, a strange, lonely little twinkle of light in the darkness, for half the wintry night. Neither Kitty nor Walter could rest next day until they had eluded the vigilance of their several guardians and escaped to their usual meeting-place, where they poured into each other’s ears the dire experiences of the previous night. Kitty had been badly scolded before, but it had been as nothing in comparison with what she had suffered on the way home and after her return. Mamma had been terrible; she had outdone herself; there had been nothing too dreadful for her to say. And papa had not stood by Kitty--the best that could be said for him was that he had taken no active part in the demolition of all her hopes. ‘For I am to be sent away to-morrow to my aunt’s in Gloucestershire--fancy in Gloucestershire!’ as if there was something specially diabolical in that county. ‘You shall not be sent away; the time has come for us to take it into our own hands,’ said Walter soberly, with a strain of resolution. He had to tell her of not unsimilar barbarities on his side. His mother had written to her trustees. She expected Mr. Wadsett from Edinburgh, who was also her man of business (for her property was in Scotland), next day. ‘To-morrow is the crisis for both of us; we must simply take it into our own hands and forestall them,’ said Walter. ‘I knew that one day it would come to this. If they force it on us it is their own doing,’ he said, with a look of determination enough to make any trustee tremble. ‘Oh, Walter!’ cried Kitty, rubbing her head against his shoulder like the kitten she was. His resolute air gave her a thrill of frightened delight. Usually she was the first person in all their conjoint movements; to be carried along now, and feel it was not her doing, but his, was a new, ecstatic, alarming sensation, which words could not express.