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Fortune's Wheel Part II.
varying the pleasant life with an oc- casional excursion to the Continent.
" Grace is petted, of course," the old lady used to say; "and per- haps I spoil her a little. I'm sure I don't know; and I don't think she generally abuses her influence. But it strikes me that, though she is kind enough to talk matters over fairly, she always contrives to have her way in the end."
Which proposition Grace, if she were present, would pleasantly dis- pose of with smiles and kisses. Possibly being too honest to deny it, she preferred to waive the point. As for her father, he was quite satisfied with the manner of her education.
" I don't fancy you will find it very easy to spoil her ; and at all events, I give you liberty to try."
And as he stroked her fair hair, and looked in her frank eyes with proud confidence, the girl probably felt that she was put upon her honour. At all events, any spoil- ing was only skin-deep ; and she grew up the most indulgent of domestic tyrants.
The sudden death of her aunt, which took place about eighteen months before her appearance at Glenconan, was a sad shock. It was somewhat softened by her finding a temporary refuge under the roof of another old friend ; for her governess had just married a Protestant pasteur at Pau, where she offered all the advantages of a home to half-a-dozen young English ladies. There she was to await her father's return.
The death of Miss Venables, on whom he had devolved his paternal responsibilities, necessarily precipi- tated Moray's arrangements. He set to work to wind up with char- acteristic energy. As he explained to his daughter afterwards " The thing had to be done, and there was little time to stand on the
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manner of doing it. So I snapped a thread here, and cut a tangle there ; and if there were knots, I untied them with my teeth or my fingers."
And when Grace remarked that she feared he must have sacrificed something considerable to his pre- cipitation, he only answered, with a laugh, that if he came home with a trifle less money than he might have done, nevertheless she would be very satisfactorily tochered ! "Which isn't at all, papa, what I meant, as you know."
Not even the most intimate of his mercantile connections knew anything of the exact amount of his wealth, for Moray never made unnecessary confidences. But it was certain that his only daughter, by her fortune, as by her looks and her birth, ought to be free to pick and choose among all manner of eligible suitors.
Miss Moray was generally good- humour itself she had the happy gift of looking on the bright side of things ; and indeed, with the sad exception of her recent bereave- ment, life had hitherto almost in- variably smiled on her. But for once Miss Moray was irritable and out of sorts ; and the consciousness of that unchristian phenomenon fretted her, so that her last state was far worse than the first, so much so, that her good friend Madame Robineau had proposed a consultation with the doctor. The bare suggestion of such an absur- dity did Miss Moray good, and for the first time for several days she actually burst out laughing.
" I don't believe I've seen a doc- tor since I had the whooping-cough ; and I am sure, in my present state of health, I am quite unfit for the interview. To face a doctor, one should be thoroughly robust. If you had spoken of a change of
