for him to do.  No doubt he had some idea, seeing how things had now arranged themselves, that he would be giving much more than he would get; and perhaps the manner of his offer might be affected by that consideration; but not on that account did he feel at all sure that he would be accepted.  Clara Amedroz was a proud girl perhaps too proud.  Indeed, it was her fault.  If her pride now interfered with her future fortune in life, it should be her fault, not his.  He would do his duty to her and to his aunt he would do it perseveringly and kindly; and then, if she refused him, the fault would not be his.

Such, I think, was the state of Captain Aylmer’s mind when he got up on the Sunday morning, resolving that he would on that day make good his promise.  And it must be remembered, on his behalf, that he would have prepared himself for his task with more animation if he had hitherto received warmer encouragement.  He had felt himself to be repulsed in the little efforts which he had already made to please the lady, and had no idea whatever as to the true state of her feelings.  Had he known what she knew, he would, I think, have been animated enough, and gone to his task as happy and thriving a lover as any.  But he was a man somewhat diffident of himself, though sufficiently conscious of the value of the worldly advantages which he possessed and he was, perhaps, a little afraid of Clara, giving her credit for an intellect superior to his own.

He had promised to walk with her on the Saturday after the reading of the will, intending to take her out through the gardens down to a farm, now belonging to himself, which lay at the back of the town, and which was held by an old widow who had been senior in life to her late landlady; but no such walk had been possible, as it was dark before the last of the visitors from Taunton had gone.  At breakfast on Sunday he again proposed the walk, offering to take her immediately after luncheon.  ‘I suppose you will not go to church?’ he said.

‘Not today.  I could hardly bring myself to do it today.’

’I think you are right.  I shall go.  A man can always do these things sooner than a lady can.  But you will come out afterwards?’ To this she assented, and then she was left alone throughout the morning.  The walk she did not mind.  That she and Captain Aylmer should walk together was all very well.  They might probably have done so had Mrs Winterfield been still alive.  It was the long evening afterwards that she dreaded the long winter evening, in which she would have to sit with him as his guest, and with him only.  She could not pass these hours without talking to him, and she felt that she could not talk to him naturally and easily.  It would, however, be but for once, and she would bear it.

They went together down to the house of Mrs Partridge, the tenant, and made their kindly speeches to the old woman.  Mrs Partridge already knew that Captain Aylmer was to be her landlord, but having hitherto seen more of Miss Amedroz than of the captain, and having always regarded her landlady’s niece as being connected irrevocably with the property, she addressed them as though the estate were a joint affair.