Tears rose in Julia’s eyes, and taking the girl in her arms, she said, ‘I’ll never leave you, my dear girl, until you yourself wish it.’

’I wish it?  Oh, Julia, you do not know me.  I have lost everything, Julia, but I mustn’t lose you...  After all, it doesn’t so much matter, so long as we are not separated.  I don’t care about money, and we can have a nice little house in London all to ourselves.  And if we get too hard up, we’ll both go out as daily governesses.  I think I could teach a little music, to young children, you know; you’d teach the older ones.’  Emily looked at Julia inquiringly, and going over to the piano, attempted to play her favourite polka.  Julia, who had once worked for her daily bread, and earned it in a sort of way by giving music-lessons, smiled sadly at the girl’s ignorance of life.

‘I see,’ said Emily, who was quick to divine every shade of sentiment passing in the minds of those she loved; ’you don’t think I could teach even the little children.’

‘My dear Emily, I hope it will never come to your having to try.’

‘I must do something to get a living,’ she replied, looking vaguely and wistfully into the fire.  ’How unfortunate all this is—­that horrid, horrid old man.  But supposing he had asked you to marry him—­he wasn’t nice, but you are older than I, and if you had married him you would have become, in a way, my stepmother.  But what a charming stepmother!  Oh, how I should have loved that!’

’Come, Emily, it is time to go to bed; you let your imagination run away with you.’

‘Julia, you are not cross because——­’

’No, dear, I’m not cross.  I’m only a little tired.  We have talked too long.’

Emily’s allusion to music-teaching had revived in Julia all her most painful memories.  If this man were to cast them penniless out of Ashwood!  Supposing, supposing that were to happen?  Starving days, pale and haggard, rose up in her memory.  What should she do, what should she do, and with that motherless girl dependent on her for food and clothes and shelter?  She buried her face in the pillow and prayed that she might be saved from such a destiny.

If this man—­this unknown creature—­were to refuse to help them, she and Emily would have to go to London, and she would have to support Emily as best she might.  She would hold to her and fight for her with all her strength, but would she not fall vanquished in the fight; and then, and then?  The same thoughts, questions, and fears turned in her head like a wheel, and it was not until dawn had begun to whiten the window-panes that she fell asleep.

A few days after, the post brought a letter for Julia.  After glancing hastily down the page she said:  ’This is a letter from Mr. Grandly, and it is good news.  Oh, what a relief!...’

‘Read it.’