Clara, of course, did answer the letter; but she wrote her answer to Mary, sending, however, one little scrap to Mary’s brother.  She wrote to Mary at great length, striving to explain, with long and laborious arguments, that it was quite impossible that she should accept the Belton estate from her cousin.  That subject, however, and the manner of her future life, she would discuss with her dear Cousin Mary, when Mary should have arrived.  And then Clara said how she would go to Taunton to meet her cousin, and how she would prepare William’s house for the reception of William’s sister; and how she would love her cousin when she should come to know her.  All of which was exceedingly proper and pretty.  Then there was a little postscript, ’Give the enclosed to William.’  And this was the note to William: 

’Dear William,

Did you not say that you would be my brother?  Be my brother always.  I will accept from your hands all that a brother could do; and when that arrangement is quite fixed, I will love you as much as Mary loves you, and trust you as completely; and I will be obedient, as a younger sister should be.

Your loving Sister, C. A.’

‘It’s all no good,’ said William Belton, as he crunched the note in his hand.  ’I might as well shoot myself.  Get out of the way there, will you?’ And the injured groom scudded across the farm-yard, knowing that there was something wrong with his master.

CHAPTER XXX

MARY BELTON

It was about the middle of the pleasant month of May when Clara Amedroz again made that often repeated journey to Taunton, with the object of meeting Mary Belton.  She had transferred herself and her own peculiar belongings back from the cottage to the house, and had again established herself there so that she might welcome her new friend.  But she was not satisfied with simply receiving her guest at Belton, and therefore she made the journey to Taunton, and settled herself for the night at the inn.  She was careful to get a bedroom for an ’invalid lady’, close to the sitting-room, and before she went down to the station she saw that the cloth was laid for tea, and that the tea parlour had been made to look as pleasant as was possible with an inn parlour.

She was very nervous as she stood upon the platform waiting for the new comer to show herself.  She knew that Mary was a cripple, but did not know how far her cousin was disfigured by her infirmity; and when she saw a pale-faced little woman, somewhat melancholy, but yet pretty withal, with soft, clear eyes, and only so much appearance of a stoop as to soften the hearts of those who saw her, Clara was agreeably surprised, and felt herself to be suddenly relieved of an unpleasant weight.  She could talk to the woman she saw there, as to any other woman, without the painful necessity of treating her always as an invalid.  ‘I think you are Miss Belton?’ she said, holding out her hand.  The likeness between Mary and her brother was too great to allow of Clara being mistaken.