Of relatives she had none left but the sister who lived in Gibraltar, and to whom she was much attached. She, therefore, resolved upon remaining in the vicinity, instead of going to England, where she knew very few people. A little kindly co-operation on the part of her late husband’s friends enabled her to start a boarding-house on a small scale, with a view to supplementing her meagre income, and she was considered to be doing very well. Among her boarders was Hugh Stavanger, who was known here as Gregory Staines, and who was supposed to be a commission agent of some sort. Mr. Staines had been rather profuse in his attentions to his pretty landlady, and Mrs. Twiley, having heard something about a whispered possible engagement, deemed it compatible with her position as sole and serious relative to warn her sister against want of caution. “You see, Phœbe,” she said gravely, “you really know next to nothing about this Mr. Staines. Certainly, he seems to have plenty of money to go on with, and pays you regularly. But you want more than that. You want to feel that his past life will bear investigation, and that he is really actuated by no mercenary motives in seeking to marry you.” “Why, good gracious, Millie! I haven’t a penny saved up, as you know; and, as for my pension, I shall forfeit that if I marry again. So how can anybody possibly want to marry me through mercenary motives?” “Will often says that with all your native shrewdness, there are some points on which you are awfully slow, and I am inclined to agree with him. Do you forget that you have a very well-furnished house, with every article in it paid for; that you have a comfortable little business nicely established; and that you are such a capital little manager that many an adventurer would jump at the chance of being kept by you? Now, don’t lose yourself in a temper, for I don’t mean to insinuate that you couldn’t be loved for yourself, apart from the material advantages you have to offer. In fact, I know different, for Archer Pallister thinks and dreams of nothing but your looks and ways, and I am sure that if he isn’t downright genuine, there isn’t a genuine man on earth. Indeed, the woman who marries him may thank her lucky stars. But there are all sorts of people knocking around, and Will says that we ought to be on our guard against Englishmen dodging about in Spain, unless they can give a very satisfactory account of themselves. For anything we know, this Gregory Staines is either an absconding building society secretary, or a fraudulent poor-rate collector.” “I think it’s real mean of you to talk like that, Millie. You ought to know me better than to think I would take up with an adventurer.” “I am glad to hear you say so, my dear. Will, too, will be highly pleased to be told that you are going to give Mr. Staines the cold shoulder.” “You are rather premature. I never said so.”