“Curious that he should not have told me, knowing as he did my interest in everything relating to Mrs. Holbrook.”

“Old people are apt to be close; and Jacob Nowell was about one of the closest customers I ever met with,” answered the lawyer.

Gilbert left him soon after this, and chartered a hansom in the next street, which carried him back to the City.  He was very uncertain as to what he ought to do for Marian, doubtful of Mr. Medler’s integrity, and yet anxious to abstain from any act that might seem uncalled for or officious.  She had her husband to look after her interests, as the lawyer had reminded him, and it was scarcely probable that Mr. Holbrook would neglect any steps necessary to secure his wife’s succession to whatever property Jacob Nowell had left.  It seemed to Gilbert that he could do nothing at present, except write to Marian, telling her of his interview with the lawyer, and advising her to lose no time in placing the conduct of her affairs in more respectable hands than those of Mr. Medler.  He mentioned his own solicitors, a City firm of high standing, as gentlemen whom she might wisely trust at this crisis of her life.

This done, he could only wait the issue of events, and he tried to occupy himself as much as possible with his business at St. Helens—­that business which he seriously intended getting rid of as soon as he could meet with a favourable opportunity for so doing.  He worked with that object in view.  In spite of his losses in Australia, he was in a position to retire from commerce with a very fair income.  He had lost all motive for sustained exertion, all desire to become rich.  A man who has no taste for expensive bachelor pleasures and no home has very little opportunity for getting rid of large sums of money.  Mr. Fenton had taken life pleasantly enough, and yet had never spent five hundred a year.  He could retire with an income of eight hundred and having abandoned all idea of ever marrying this seemed to him more than sufficient.

The Listers had come back to England, and Mrs. Lister had written to her brother more than once, begging him to run down to Lidford.  Of course she had expressed herself freely upon the subject of Marian’s conduct in these letters, reprobating the girl’s treachery and ingratitude, and congratulating Gilbert upon his escape from so ineligible a connection.  Mr. Fenton had put his sister off with excuses hitherto, and had subjected himself thereby to sundry feminine reproaches upon his coldness and want of affection for Mrs. Lister and her children.  “It was very different when Marian Nowell was here,” she wrote; “you thought it no trouble to come to us then.”

No answer came to his letter to Mrs. Holbrook—­which scarcely called for a reply, unless it had been a few lines of thanks, in acknowledgment of his interest in her behalf.  He had looked for such a letter, and was a little disappointed by its non-appearance.  The omission, slight as it was, served to strengthen his bitter feeling that his friendship in this quarter was unneeded and unvalued.