"Exactly!" said Mr. Creswell. "As I say, it isn't as if it were a stranger! Marian has been domiciled with us now for some time, and there is no reason why, so far as you and she are concerned, things should not go on exactly as they have done! At least, I know this to be her wish and mine!" he added, after a short pause.
"Whatever is your wish, uncle, I'm sure Gertrude and I will be delighted to fulfil"
"Delighted!" interposed Gertrude.
"And I don't think Miss Ashurst will find us give her any trouble!"
"Miss Ashurst! Why not speak of her as Marian, my dear?" said Mr. Creswell.
"She has always been Miss Ashurst to me hitherto, and you know I'm not going to marry her, uncle!" said Maud, almost brusquely.
"What do you think of Miss A. now?" said Gertrude, when the girls were back in their room. "I used to laugh about her being superior! But she has shown herself superior to us with a vengeance! Fancy having her for an aunt, and having to ask her permission to do this and that, and go here and there! Oh my! Why don't you speak, Maud—why don't you say something about all this?"
"Because I can't trust myself to speak," said Maud, hurriedly. "Because I'm afraid of blurting out something that were better left unsaid."
"Oh, then, you're not so pleased at the connexion! I'm sure by the way in which you wished your uncle happiness, one would have thought that the dearest wish of your heart had been realised. What do you think of Miss A.'s conduct, I mean as regards this matter?"
"Just what I think of it, and have always thought of it as regards every other matter, that it is selfish, base, and deceitful. That woman came here with a predetermined plan of marrying uncle, and chance has helped her to carry it into effect, even more quickly than she anticipated. Tom saw that, he told us so, if you recollect. Poor Tom! he was a dull, unpleasant lad, but he was wonderfully shrewd, and he saw through this woman's tactics in a minute, and determined to spoil them. He would have done so, had he lived, and now, I've no doubt that the very fact of his death has been the means of hurrying uncle into taking this step!"
"Do you think Miss A. cares for uncle, Maud?"
"Cares for him—what do you mean?"
"Well, of course, I don't mean to be awfully fond, and all that sort of thing, like lovers, you know, and all that! What do you think she—well, she's fond of him?"
"Of him? No! she's fond of his name and his position, his money and his influence! She's fond of Woolgreaves, she has become accustomed to its comforts, and she does not choose to give them up!"
"I don't know that Miss A. is to be particularly pitched into for that, Maud," said Gertrude. "I think, perhaps, we ought to look at home before making any such suggestions! We have become accustomed to the comforts of Woolgreaves, and we—at least I—should be uncommonly sorry to give them up!"
"Well, but we have some claim to them; at all events we are of uncle's blood, and did not come here designedly, with a view to establish ourselves here, as I'm certain this woman did! And when you talk of our not giving up our present life—look to it!"
"Look, Maud! what do you mean?"
"What do I mean! That we shall have to change our lives very quickly! You don't suppose Marian Ashurst is going to live her life with us as constant reminders to her of what was? You don't suppose that we—that I, at least, am going to waste my life with her as my rock ahead—not I, indeed!"
"Well, Maud," said Gertrude, quietly, "I don't suppose anything about anything! I never do. What you propose I shall agree to, and that's all I know or all I care for!"
It was Marian's wish that the marriage should be delayed for some little time, but Mr. Creswell was of the opposite advice, and thought it would be better to have the ceremony as soon as possible. "Life is very short, Marian," he said, "and I am too old to think of deferring my happiness. I am looking to you as my wife to brighten and soothe the rest of my days, and I am selfish enough to grudge every one of them until you are in that position! It is all very well for young people to have their term of courtship and engagement, and all the rest of it, but you are going to throw yourself away on an old man, dear one," and he smiled fondly and patted her cheek, "and you must be content to dispense with that, and come to him at once!"
"Content is not the word to express my feelings and wishes in the matter!" said Marian; "only I thought that—after
