lad was well educated in certain things, for
which Mr. Horner had thought that he had
shown especial aptitude; and there was a
kind of implied apology to my lady in one
sentence, where he stated that Harry's lameness
would prevent his being ever able to
gain his living by the exercise of any mere
bodily faculties, "as had been wished by a
lady whose wishes he, the testator, was
bound to regard."

But there was a codicil to the will, dated
since Lord Ludlow's death—feebly written
by Mr. Horner himself, as if in preparation
only for some more formal manner of
bequest; or, perhaps, only as a mere temporary
arrangement till he could see a lawyer, and
have a fresh will made. In this he revoked
his previous bequest to Harry Gregson. He
only left two hundred pounds to Mr. Gray to
be used, as that gentleman thought best, for
Henry Gregson's benefit. With this one
exception, he bequeathed all the rest of his
savings to my lady, with a hope that they
might form a nest-egg, as it were, towards
the paying off of the mortgage which had
been such a grief to him during his life. I
may not repeat all this in lawyer's phrase; I
heard it through Miss Galindo, and she
might make mistakes. Though, indeed, she
was very clear-headed, and soon earned the
respect of Mr. Smithson, my lady's lawyer
from Warwick. Mr. Smithson knew Miss
Galindo a little before, both personally and
by reputation; but I don't think he was
prepared to find her installed as steward's
clerk, and, at first, he was inclined to treat
her, in this capacity, with polite contempt.
But Miss Galindo was both a lady and a
spirited, sensible woman, and she could put
aside her self-indulgence in eccentricity of
speech and manner whenever she chose.
Nay more; she was usually so talkative, that
if she had not been amusing and warm-
hearted, one might have thought her wearisome
occasionally. But, to meet Mr. Smithson,
she came out daily in her Sunday gown; she
said no more than was required in answer to
his questions; her books and papers were in
thorough order, and methodically kept; her
statements of matters-of-fact accurate, and to
be relied on. She was amusingly conscious
of her victory over his contempt of a woman-
clerk and his pre-conceived opinion of her
unpractical eccentricity.

"Let me alone," said she, one day when
she came in to sit awhile with me. "That
man is a good man—a sensible man—and, I
have no doubt, he is a good lawyer; but he
can't fathom women yet. I make no doubt
he'll go back to Warwick, and never give
credit again to those people who made him
think me half-cracked to begin with. O, my
dear, he did! He showed it twenty times
worse than my poor dear master ever did.
It was a form to be gone through to please
my lady, and, for her sake, he would hear
my statements and see my books. It was
keeping a woman out of harm's way at any
rate to let her fancy herself useful. I read
the man. And, I am thankful to say, he
cannot read me. At least, only one side of
me. When I see an end to be gained, I can
behave myself accordingly. Here was a man
who thought that a woman in a black silk
gown was a respectable, orderly kind of
person; and I was a woman in a black silk
gown. He believed that a woman could
not write straight lines, and required a man
to tell her that two and two made four. I
was not above ruling my books, and had
Cocker a little more at my fingers' ends than
he had. But my greatest triumph has been
holding my tongue. He would have thought
nothing of my books, or my sums, or my
black silk gown, if I had spoken unasked.
So I have buried more sense in my bosom
these ten days than ever I have uttered in
the whole course of my life before. I have
been so curt, so abrupt, so abominably dull,
that I'll answer for it he thinks me worthy
to be a man. But I must go back to him,
my dear, so good-bye to conversation and
you."

But though Mr. Smithson might be satisfied
with Miss Galindo, I am afraid she was
the only part of the affair with which he was
content. Everything else went wrong. I
could not say who told me so—but the
conviction of this seemed to pervade the house.
I never knew how much we had all looked
up to the silent, gruff Mr. Horner for
decisions until he was gone. My lady herself
was a pretty good woman of business, as
women of business go. Her father, seeing
that she would be the heiress of the
Hanbury property, had given her a training
which was thought unusual in those days,
and she liked to feel herself queen regnant,
and to have to decide in all cases between
herself and her tenantry. But, perhaps, Mr.
Horner would have done it more wisely; not
but what she always attended to him at last.
She would begin by saying pretty clearly and
promptly what she would have done, and
what she would not have done. If Mr.
Horner approved of it, he bowed, and set
about obeying her directly; if he disapproved
of it, he bowed, and lingered so long before
he obeyed her, that she forced his opinion
out of him with her "Well, Mr. Horner!
and what have you to say against it?" For
she always understood his silence as well as
if he had spoken. But the estate was pressed
for ready money, and Mr. Horner had grown
gloomy and languid since the death of his
wife, and even his own personal affairs were
not in the order in which they had been a
year or two before, for his old clerk had
gradually become superannuated, or, at any
rate, unable by the superfluity of his own
energy and wit to supply the spirit that was
wanting in Mr. Horner.

Day after day Mr. Smithson seemed to
grow more fidgety, more annoyed at the