’Oh, Priscilla, do not say that.  If I have a child will you not love it?’

’It will be your child, not mine.  Do you suppose that I complain.  I know that it is right.  I know that you ought to be married and I ought not.  I know that there is not a man in Devonshire who would take me, or a man in Devonshire whom I would accept.  I know that I am quite unfit for any other kind of life than this.  I should make any man wretched, and any man would make me wretched.  But why is it so?  I believe that you would make any man happy.’

‘I hope to make Brooke happy.’

’Of course you will, and therefore you deserve it.  We’ll go home now, dear, and get mamma’s things ready for the great day.’

On the afternoon before the great day all the visitors were to come, and during the forenoon old Miss Stanbury was in a great fidget.  Luckily for Dorothy, her own preparations were already made, so that she could give her time to her aunt without injury to herself.  Miss Stanbury had come to think of herself as though all the reality of her life had passed away from her.  Every resolution that she had formed had been broken.  She had had the great enemy of her life, Barty Burgess, in the house with her upon terms that were intended to be amicable, and had arranged with him a plan for the division of the family property.  Her sister-in-law, whom in the heyday of her strength she had chosen to regard as her enemy, and with whom even as yet there had been no recon, was about to become her guest, as was also Priscilla whom she had ever disliked almost as much as she had respected.  She had quarrelled utterly with Hugh in such a manner as to leave no possible chance of a reconciliation, and he also was about to be her guest.  And then, as to her chosen heir, she was now assisting him in doing the only thing, as to which she had declared that if he did do it, he should not be her heir.  As she went about the house, under an idea that such a multiplicity of persons could not be housed and fed without superhuman exertion, she thought of all this, and could not help confessing to herself that her life had been very vain.  It was only when her eyes rested on Dorothy, and she saw how supremely happy was the one person whom she had taken most closely to her heart, that she could feel that she had done anything that should not have been left undone.  ‘I think I’ll sit down now, Dorothy,’ she said, ’or I sha’n’t be able to be with you tomorrow.’

’Do, aunt.  Everything is all ready, and nobody will be here for an hour yet.  Nothing can be nicer than the rooms, and nothing ever was done so well before.  I’m only thinking how lonely you’ll be when we’re gone.’

‘It’ll be only for six weeks.’

‘But six weeks is such a long time.’

’What would it have been if he had taken you up to London, my pet?  Are you sure your mother wouldn’t like a fire in her room, Dorothy?’

‘A fire in September, aunt?’