He was a young man who could not be called handsome; beside Wellfield he looked exceedingly plain, with his square-cut, rather heavy face, and decidedly clumsy figure. Yet about this young manufacturer, with his want of grace and polish, there was the charm of a candid, benevolent, truth-loving nature, which charm showed in the clear, pleasant light-brown eyes, which redeemed him from insignificance, and made him an agreeable companion. He was quiet, decidedly. Jerome remembered that in the old days when they had both been children together, he had been, not shy, but a silent, reserved, observant boy, with decided likes and dislikes. By-and-by, Leyburn went and sat down beside Nita on the sofa. They appeared to be on squabbling terms, which naturally implies intimacy. Mr. Bolton looked benevolently at them over his newspaper, and Jerome, with a sudden sense which was not altogether a pleasurable one, began to wonder if this were ‘a case.’ No, he did not like the idea—why, he hardly knew, since it could not possibly matter anything to him; but it seemed to shut him more entirely than ever out from all that should have been his. With rapid, unreasonable foresight, he pictured Nita and her cousin man and wife, in safe and secure possession of the Abbey and its lands, with perhaps children to inherit them, and money in abundance to keep it all up. The idea galled and hurt him excessively, and he sat silently, and somewhat moodily pondering upon it until supper was announced. It appeared that early hours were the rule at the Abbey. After supper, Mr. Bolton retired to one end of the huge drawing-room to a table on which stood a reading-lamp, and he was soon lost in a book of travels in the South Seas. Nita and the two young men were left to entertain one another as they chose. Jerome was somewhat taciturn, observing the incessant conversation, friendly squabbles and unmistakable real liking between Nita Bolton and John Leyburn. About ten o’clock Leyburn said good-night. By half-past ten all the household were in their rooms. Jerome opened his window and looked out. The same moon, only fuller, as that which had lighted his meditations in Manchester, shone here, and silvered the old Abbey gardens, and the ancient walks, and the motionless trees. His heart was sore as heart could be. These people were not what he had expected, and perhaps that added to the sting of his vexation. They were not purse-proud, vulgar upstarts. They were plain and homely, but gentle and gracious. It was not some vulgar man who held and who would inherit his patrimony; it was a man whose whole character and aspect compelled respect and even admiration, and a girl in whose eyes dwelt gentleness and goodness, and whose ways were all kind and womanly and girlish. He pondered over it all, and looked again upon the beauty of it, and muttered to himself: ‘Mine by right—mine before God! and it shall be mine again, too.’ [Illustration] CHAPTER IV. NITA’S DIARY.