venture. Indeed, Jane forbade me; she is a sort of lioness and her whelps. Well, the next day came Mr. Morrison, who is the Mr. Richardson to this concern, and by-and-by he asked to see me. He kept the doctor in the next room. I believe he thought I should faint or make some such performance, for he began about his painful duty, and frightened me lest my poor uncle should be worse, only he was not the right man to tell me. So at last it came out that we were ruined, and I was not an heiress at all, at all! If it had not been for poor Uncle Oliver, I should have cried 'Hurrah!' I did nearly laugh to hear him complimenting my firmness. I believe the history is this:-Hearing that this place was for sale, brought Uncle Oliver home before his affairs could well do without him. He paid half the price, and promised to pay the rest in three years, giving security on the mines and the other property in Peru; but somehow the remittances have never come properly, and he trusted to some great success with the Equatorial Company to set things straight, but it seems that it has totally failed, and that was the news that overthrew him. Then the creditors, who had been put off with hopes, all came down on him together, and there seems to be nothing to be done but to give up everything to them. Poor Uncle Oliver!-I sat watching him that evening, and thinking how Louis would say the sea had swept away his whole sand castle with one wave.'
'Does he know it? Have any steps been taken?'
'Mr. Morrison showed me what my poor uncle had done. He had really executed a deed giving me the whole estate; he would have borne all the disgrace and persecution himself-for you know it would have been a most horrible scrape, as he had given them security on property that was not really secure. Mr. Morrison said the deed would hold, and that he would bring me counsel's opinion if I liked. But, oh, Jem! I was so thankful that my birthday was over, and I was my own woman! I made him draw up a paper, and I signed it, undertaking that they shall have quiet possession provided they will come to an amicable settlement, and not torment my uncle.'
'I hope he is a man of sense, who will make the best terms?'
'You may see to that now. I'm sure he is a man of compliments. He tells me grand things about my disinterestedness, and the creditors and they have promised to let us stay unmolested as long as I please, which will be only till my uncle can move, for I must get rid of all these servants and paraphernalia, and in the meantime they are concocting the amicable adjustment, and Mr. Morrison said he should try to stipulate for a maintenance for my uncle, but he was not sure of it, without giving up what may yet come from Peru. Jane's annuity is safe-that is a comfort! What work I had to make her believe it! and now she wants us all to live upon it.'
'That was a rare and beautiful power by which my grandmother infused such faithful love into all her dependants. But now for the person really to be pitied.'
'It was only three days ago that it was safe to speak of it, but then he had grown so anxious that the doctors said I must begin. So I begged and prayed him to forgive me, and then told what I had done, and he was not so very angry. He only called me a silly child, and said I did not know what I had done in those few days that I had been left to myself. So I told him dear granny had had it, and that was all that signified, and that I never had any right here. Then,' said Clara, tearfully, 'he began to cry like a child, and said at least she had died in her own home, and he called me Henry's child: and then Jane came and turned me out, and wont let me go near him unless I promise to be good and say nothing. But I must soon; for however she pats him, and says, 'Don't, Master Oliver,' I see his mind runs on nothing else, and the doctor says he may soon hear the plans, and be moved.'
'Can you venture to tell him that I am here?'
Before Clara could answer, Jane opened the door-'Miss Clara, your uncle;' and there she stopped, at the unexpected sight of the brother and sister still hand in hand. 'Here, Jane, do you see him?' cried Clara; and James came forward with outstretched hand, but he was not graciously received.
'Now, Master James, you ain't coming here to worrit your poor uncle?'
'No, indeed, Jane. I am come in the hope of being of some use to him.'
'I'd rather by half it had been Lord Fitzjocelyn,' muttered Jane, 'he was always quieter.'
'Now, Jane, you should not be so cross,' cried Clara, 'when it is your own Jemmy, come on purpose to help and comfort us all! You are going to tell Uncle Oliver, and make him glad to see him, as you know you are.'
'I know,' said James, 'that last time I was here, I behaved ill enough to make you dread my presence, Jane; but I have learnt and suffered a good deal since that time, and I wish for nothing so much as for my uncle's pardon.'
Mrs. Beckett would have been more impressed, had she ever ceased to think of Master Jemmy otherwise than as a self-willed but candid boy; and she answered as if he had been throwing himself on her mercy after breaking a window, or knocking down Lord Fitzjocelyn-
'Well, sir, that is all you can say. I'm glad you are sorry. I'll see if I can mention, it to your uncle.'
Off trotted Jane, while Clara's indignation and excited spirits relieved themselves by a burst of merry laughter, as she hung about her brother, and begged to hear of the dear old home.
The old servant, in her simplicity, went straight upstairs, and up to her nursling, as he had again become. 'Master Oliver,' said she, 'he is come. Master Jem is come back, and 'twould do your heart good to see how happy the children are together-just like you and poor Master Henry.'
'Did she ask him here?' said Mr. Dynevor, uneasily.
'No, sir, he came right out of his own head, because he thought she would feel lost.'
Oliver vouchsafed no reply, and Jane pressed no farther. He never alluded to his guest; but when Clara came into the room, his eye dwelt on her countenance of bright content and animation, and the smiles that played round her lips as she sat silent. Her voice was hushed in the sick-room, but he heard it about the house with the blithe, lively ring that had been absent from it since he carried her away from Northwold; and her steps danced upstairs, and along the galleries, with the light, bounding tread unknown to the constrained, dignified Miss Dynevor. Ah the notice he took that night was to say, petulantly, when Clara was sitting with him, 'Don't stay here; you want to be down-stairs.'
'Oh, no, dear uncle, I am come to stay with you. I don't want, in the least, to be anywhere but here.'
He seemed pleased, although he growled; and next morning Jane reported that he had been asking for how long his nephew had come, and saying he was glad that Miss Dynevor had someone to look after her-a sufferance beyond expectation. In his helpless state, Jane had resumed her nursery relations with him; and he talked matters over with her so freely that it was well that the two young people were scarcely less her children, and had almost an equal share of her affection, so that Clara felt that matters might be safely trusted in her hands.
Clara's felicity could hardly be described, with her fond affections satisfied by her brother's presence, and her fears of managing ill, removed by reliance on him; and many as were the remaining cases, and great as was the suspense lest her uncle should still nourish resentment, nothing could overcome the sense of restored joy ever bubbling up, not even the dread that James might not bear patiently with continued rebuffs. But James was so much more gentle and tolerant than she had ever known him, that at first she could not understand missing the retort, the satire, the censure which had seemed an essential part of her brother. She was always instinctively guarding against what never happened, or if some slight demonstration flashed out, he caught himself up, and asked pardon before she had perceived anything, till she began to think marriage had altered him wonderfully, and almost to owe Isabel a grudge for having cowed his spirit. She could hardly believe that he was waiting so patiently in the guise of a suppliant, when she thought him in the right from the first; though she could perceive that the task was easier now that the old man was in adversity, and she saw that he regarded his exclusion from his uncle's room in the light of a just punishment, to be endured with humility.
James, on his side, was highly pleased with his sister. Having only seen her as the wild, untamed Giraffe, he was by no means prepared for the dignity and decision with which Miss Dynevor reigned over the establishment. Her tall figure, and the simple, straightforward ease of her movements and manners, seemed made to grace those large, lofty rooms; and as he watched her playing the part of mistress of the house so naturally in the midst of the state, the servants, the silver covers, and the trappings, he felt that heiress-ship became her so well, that he could hardly believe that her tenure there was over, and unregretted. 'Even Isabel could not do it better,' he said, smiling; and she made a low curtsey for the compliment, and laughed back, 'I'm glad you have come to see my performance. It has been a very long, dull pageant, and here comes Mr. Morrison, I hope with the last act.'
Morrison was evidently much relieved that Miss Dynevor should have some relative to advise with, since he did not like the responsibility of her renunciation, though owning that it was the only thing that could save her uncle from disgraceful ruin, and perhaps from prosecution; whereas now the gratitude and forbearance of the creditors were secured, and he hoped that Mr. Dynevor might be set free from the numerous English involvements, without sacrificing his remaining property in Peru. The lawyer seemed to have no words to express to James his sense of Miss Dynevor's conduct in the matter, her promptitude and good sense having apparently struck him as much as her
