At length Mr. Corbet grew impatient at not
hearing either from Mr. Wilkins or Ellinor, and
wrote urgently to the former, making known to
him a new proposal suggested to him by his
father, which was, that a certain sum should be
paid down by Mr. Wilkins, which should be
applied, under the management of trustees, to
the improvement of the Bromley estate, out of
the profits of which, or other sources in the
elder Mr. Corbet's hands, a heavy rate of interest
should be paid on this money, which would
secure an income to the young couple immediately,
and considerably increase the value of the
estate upon which Ellinor's settlement was to be
made. The terms offered for this laying down
of ready money were so advantageous that Mr.
Wilkins was strongly tempted to accede to them
at once; as Ellinor's pale cheek and want of
appetite had only that very morning smote upon
his conscience, and this immediate transfer of
ready money was, as a sacrifice, a soothing balm
to his self-reproach, and laziness and dislike to
immediate unpleasantness of action had its
counterbalancing weakness in imprudence. Mr.
Wilkins made some rough calculations on a piece
of paper—deeds, and all such tests of accuracy
being down at the office—discovered that he
could pay down the sum required; wrote a letter
agreeing to the proposal, and before he sealed it
called Ellinor into his study, and bade her read
what he had been writing, and tell him what she
thought of it. He watched the colour come
rushing into her white face, her lips quiver and
tremble, and even before the letter was ended
she was in his arms, kissing him, and thanking
him with blushing caresses rather than words.

"There, there!" said he, smiling and sighing;
"that will do. Why, I do believe you took me
for a hard-hearted father, just like a heroine's
father in a book. You've looked as wobegone
this week past as Ophelia. One can't make up
one's mind in a day about such sums of money as
this, little woman; and you should have let your
old father have time to consider."

"Oh, papa! I was only afraid you were
angry."

"Well, if I was a bit perplexed, seeing you
look so ill and pining was not the way to bring
me round. Old Corbet, I must say, is trying to
make a good bargain for his son. It is well for
me that I have never been an extravagant man."

"But, papa, we don't want all this much."

"Yes, yes! it is all right. You shall go into
their family as a well-portioned girl, if you can't
go as a Lady Maria. Come, don't trouble your
little head any more about it. Give me one more
kiss, and then we'll go and order the horses, and
have a ride together, by way of keeping holiday.
I deserve a holiday, don't I, Nelly?"

Some country people at work at the roadside,
as the father and daughter passed along, stopped
to admire their bright happy looks, and one
spoke of the hereditary handsomeness of the
Wilkins family (for the old man, the present
Mr. Wilkins's father, had been fine-looking in
his drab breeches and gaiters, and usual assumption
of a yeoman's dress). Another said it was
easy for the rich to be handsome; they had
always plenty to eat, and could ride when they
were tired of walking, and had no care for the
morrow to keep them from sleeping at nights.
And in sad acquiescence with their contrasted
lot, the men went on with their hedging and
ditching in silence.

And yet, if they had known— if the poor did
know—the troubles and temptations of the rich;
if those men had foreseen the lot darkening over
the father, and including the daughter in its
cloud; if Mr. Wilkins himself had even imagined
such a future possible . . . . . Well, there was
truth in the old heathen saying, "Let no man be
envied till his death."

Ellinor had no more rides with her father;
no, not ever again; though they had stopped that
afternoon at the summit of a breezy common,
and looked at a ruined hall, not so very far off,
and discussed whether they could reach it that
day, and decided that it was too far away for
anything but a hurried inspection, and that some
day soon they would make the old place into the
principal object of an excursion. But a rainy
time came on, when no rides were possible; and
whether it was the influence of the weather, or
some other care or trouble that oppressed him,
Mr. Wilkins seemed to lose all wish for much
active exercise, and rather sought a stimulus
to his spirits and circulation in wine. But of
this Ellinor was innocently unaware. He seemed
dull and weary, and sat long, drowsing and
drinking after dinner. If the servants had not
been so fond of him for much previous generosity
and kindness, they would have complained now,
and with reason, of his irritability, for all sorts of
things seemed to annoy him.

"You should get the master to take a ride
with you, miss," said Dixon, one day, as he was
putting Ellinor on her horse. " He is not
looking well. He is studying too much at the
office."

But when Ellinor named it to her father, he
rather hastily replied that it was all very well for
women to ride out whenever they liked—men
had something else to do; and then, as he saw
her look grave and puzzled, he softened down his
abrupt saying by adding that Dunster had been
making a fuss about his partner's non-attendance,
and altogether taking a good deal upon
himself in a very offensive way, so that he
thought it better to go pretty regularly to the
office, in order to show him who was master—
senior partner, and head of the business, at any
rate.

Ellinor sighed a little over her disappointment
at her father's preoccupation, and then forgot
her own little regret in anger at Mr. Dunster,
who had seemed all along to be a thorn in her
father's side, and had latterly gained some power
and authority over him, the exercise of which
Ellinor could not help thinking was a very
impertinent line of conduct from a junior partner,