The sale of Martin Bransby's handsome furniture, books, plate, carriage, and horses realized a considerable sum; but only a small portion of that sum remained when all debts were paid. Theodore made all the arrangements, and Mrs. Bransby passively acquiesced in them. She was crushed by grief, and timidly acknowledged herself to be sadly helpless and ignorant of business matters.

It was Theodore who had decided that the family should leave Oldchester. It was Theodore who had taken a house for them in a northern suburb of London. It was Theodore who suggested that Mrs. Bransby might eke out her income by receiving one or two lodgers. For Martin's schooling he promised to be responsible; and he would also guarantee the rent of the London house for one twelvemonth. But he could promise no further assistance, giving as a sufficient reason for not doing more the heavy claims on his purse which would result from his forthcoming political candidature.

A tiny annual sum was secured to the widow—a sum smaller than that which she had been in the habit of spending on her dress; and this was all she had to rely on to keep herself and her five children. It was clear that an effort must be made to earn some money.

Some articles of furniture remaining from the Oldchester sale nearly sufficed to furnish the small London dwelling. The house, fortunately, was clean, freshly painted, and in good repair; but the vulgar wall-papers were an affliction to Mrs. Bransby's eyes, and the dimensions of the rooms seemed to her painfully cramped. When she ventured to hint as much to her stepson he gave her a severe lecture, and begged her to understand that the days when her whims could be lavishly indulged were over.

"But it can scarcely be called a whim to want air for my children to breathe!" returned Mrs. Bransby, with a flash of indignation which she repented the next moment. And when Theodore pointed out that the house was a remarkably airy one for the rent; and that he, in his kind consideration, had taken a great deal of trouble to find a dwelling for them in a healthy locality, she meekly apologized for having been betrayed into any expression of impatience, and promised to make the best of her new circumstances.

They were such as might have depressed a stronger and less sensitive person. When Theodore had gone away, and the children were in bed, and the widow sat alone in the mean little room which, small as it was, was but dimly illuminated by one candle, the sense of her forlorn position weighed her down, and seemed to make the atmosphere thick with misery. It was not the loss of material luxuries which afflicted her. A month ago she would have felt that keenly; but now her great sorrow had absorbed all minor troubles. Poverty! What was poverty, compared with desolation of spirit? How willingly would she have faced severer bodily hardships than any which threatened her if her lost husband could be restored to her!

She dropped her head on her folded arms resting on the table. The widow's cap slipped aside, and a veil of bright, brown, waving hair fell over her bowed face. She had been forced to restrain her tears all day. There were the children to be thought of. There were Theodore's cold, clear questions and suggestions to be answered. But now, in solitude, her tears gushed out. She wept with long, deep-drawn sobs. The words of the Litany seemed to be repeated over and over again, as by a voice whispering in her ear, "The fatherless children, and widows, and all who are desolate and oppressed." She rocked herself from side to side, and moaned out, "Oh, come back to us! Come back, Martin—Martin!"

A hand was gently laid on her shoulder. With a great start she raised her head, and saw her eldest boy standing by her side.

He was a handsome boy, very like his father. But now his naturally ruddy face was pale, and his eyes had a depth of yearning tenderness in them which went to his mother's heart.

"Don't cry so, mother dear!" he said. "Father couldn't bear to see it, if he knew."

She clasped the boy in her arms; and, although she still wept, her sobs were less convulsive, and she gradually grew calmer. Martin stood beside her very quietly, occasionally stroking back the pretty soft hair which strayed over her face, and was damp with tears.

Presently Mrs. Bransby said, "I thought you were in bed, Martin. How silently you came downstairs!"

"I took off my shoes, mother," he answered, showing his feet. "I didn't want to disturb the others. The children are asleep, and Phoebe is snoring away."

Phoebe was their one servant, a housemaid from their Oldchester home—who had volunteered to remain with them and follow their fortunes.

"Poor Phoebe! I dare say she is tired," said Mrs. Bransby.

"I should think she was rather. She has been working like a brick all day," returned Martin.

There was a little silence, during which Mrs. Bransby dried her eyes, put up her dishevelled hair, and replaced her cap.

"Ought you not to go to bed, my boy?" she said, looking wistfully at him.

"I want to stay and talk to you quietly a little, mother."

Mrs. Bransby hesitated. "I should dearly like you to stay awhile, Martin," she answered; "but I'm afraid it would not be right. You look pale and worn out. You and I must help each other now to do what is right;—and what—what he would have wished," she added with quivering lips.

"Yes, mother," answered the boy eagerly. "That's just what I want; and I know he would have wished me to spare you all the bother I can. So now just listen, mother; indeed, indeed I couldn't sleep if I went to bed now—and it's far wearier work to lie awake than to sit up and talk. Look here, mother; Theodore has offered to send me to school, hasn't he?"

"Yes, Martin. I am very thankful for that. I don't see how I could have afforded it."

"Well, but now, I've been thinking that it would be better if Theodore would give you that money, instead of paying for my schooling, and for me to get a situation and earn something."

"Earn! My darling boy, how could you earn anything?"

"Why, mother, I could do all that the office boy did at Oldchester. Old Tuckey told me once that he earned fifteen shillings a-week. Just fancy, mother! That's a good lot, isn't it?"

It looked a very childish face that he turned towards his mother: a face with frank, sparkling eyes and rounded cheeks, to which the excitement of making this proposition had brought back the roses.

"Oh, Martin, my dearest boy, it is sweet of you to think of this! But you are too young, darling."

"I'm going on for thirteen, mother!" interrupted Martin.

"Yes, dear; but still even that is very, very young," answered his mother gravely, although the phantom of a smile flitted across her pale face.

Martin looked disappointed, and, for a moment, almost angry. He had a naturally hot temper. But he battled down the temptation, and merely said, "Well, mother, you need not decide anything to-night. You can think it over. I believe I could earn something; and I'm sure that if I can, I ought."

"But your education, Martin!"

"I might, perhaps, go on learning a little at home—in the evenings," he rejoined, but more slowly, and less confidently than he had spoken before.

"You know, Martin, he wished you to study. He was so proud of your abilities—so fond of you——" Her voice broke, and she turned away her head.

"Yes, mother; but he was fonder of you," answered Martin simply. "I know quite well that if father could speak to me now, this minute, he would say, 'Martin, take care of your mother.' That's what he did say one day when I was alone with him, only a week before——" The boy paused, made a violent struggle to master his emotion, and then went on bravely, though his young face grew white to the lips, "And I'm going to do it, please God!"

The tears that poured down his mother's cheeks as she embraced him and kissed his forehead were not all bitter. "Not desolate—not wholly desolate," she murmered, "while I have you, my precious, precious son!"

They sat awhile, talking of their means, and their plans, and their prospects. Mrs. Bransby felt that although many of Martin's notions were, of course, crude and childish, yet there was a strain of firm manliness in him on which she could rely; and the boy had a quick intelligence. Before parting from his mother for the night, he proposed that she should write to Owen Rivers and ask his advice. "You'll believe what Mr. Rivers says, mother, if you don't believe me. And I think you'll find that he will consider it my duty to earn something if I can; anyway, he's such a good fellow, and has such a thundering lot of sense, he's sure to give us good advice."

The widow caught at the suggestion; she had almost as implicit faith in Owen as her children had. She promised that Martin should enclose a letter of his own in hers to Mr. Rivers; and when she bade the boy "good night" at the door of his poor little chamber, she was surprised to find her heart somewhat lightened of its load.

"I say, look here, mother!" whispered Martin, beckoning her in from the open door. "Don't those young shavers sleep like one o'clock?" He pointed to Bobby and Billy, who occupied one large bed—a relic from the Oldchester nursery—while Martin's little camp-bedstead was squeezed into a corner of the same room. The two little fellows were sleeping the profound sleep of healthy childhood. Bobby had a smile on his parted lips, and Billy lay with one fat hand doubled up under his cheek, and the other buried in the thick masses of his brother's curly hair.

"This isn't half a bad room when the window's wide open," went on Martin cheerfully. "I can see a tree—quite a good-sized elm—from my bed. Good night, mother dear; I hope you'll sleep. I think this'll turn out an awfully nice little house, when we get used to it."

The two letters to Owen Rivers—Martin's and his mother's—were written the next morning. Mrs. Bransby sent them under cover to Mr. Bragg, addressed to Oldchester, to be forwarded, and with a line from herself to Mr. Bragg, begging that he would let Mr. Rivers have them without delay. She had written very fully and frankly to Owen, telling him, without reserve, what her means were. Only on one point had she been reticent—Theodore's conduct. In her heart she thought Theodore cruelly cold and hard towards her and the children. But she would not complain of him; he was her dear husband's son, and she felt as if it would be disloyal to that honoured husband's memory to paint Theodore to others as she saw him.

Theodore's recommendation to his step-mother, to "take good, steady, paying lodgers," was in the nature of those vague counsels we are all apt to proffer freely to our neighbours; such as, to "cheer up;" not to "yield to weakness;" to "look on the bright side;" to "dismiss disagreeable thoughts;" to "set to work briskly and earn money," and the like. That is to say, it was easier said than done. When, after the family had been somewhat over a week in town, Theodore came again to see them, and found that no steps had been taken to carry out this suggestion, he showed considerable displeasure, and said a sharp word or two about the difficulty of helping unpractical people.

This word, "unpractical," was, in fact, a favourite reproach to apply to poor Mrs. Bransby on the part of a great many persons. Mrs. Dormer-Smith caught it up from Theodore. Constance Hadlow echoed the same phrase when, at length, in answer to some private inquiries of Mrs. Dormer-Smith's, she wrote about the Bransby family.

May's first eager proposal to go and see Mrs. Bransby was met by her aunt with an absolute refusal; but she was so urgent, and appealed so strongly to her uncle, that Mrs. Dormer-Smith, making a virtue of necessity (for she feared that if leave were refused May might go without it), graciously consented that her niece should pay one visit to Mrs. Bransby.

"One visit will be enough, May," said Aunt Pauline. "Quite enough to show that you feel kindly towards her, and that sort of thing. It is really stretching a point. However, if it must be, it must be. I only implore you not to talk about these people in society. Pray, pray do not poser as a district visitor, or whatever it is called."

May shrugged her shoulders, and was silent. She knew how vain it was to reason with Aunt Pauline on a point of this kind; but she comforted herself by looking forward to the time—very near now—when Owen would return, and when, in some mysterious way, not explicable to her head, but quite sufficing to her heart, all her difficulties would vanish before his presence. And that same afternoon she set off to Collingwood Place, Barnsbury Road, in a cab, attended by Smithson.

Mrs. Bransby received her affectionately, and thanked her for her visit; but she did not ask her to repeat it. She perceived, far more quickly than May had perceived it, that Mrs. Dormer-Smith would not like her niece to keep up any intimacy with a family who lived in Barnsbury, and were served by one maid-of-all-work. When the children clung round May, and clamoured to know when she was coming to see them again, Mrs. Bransby interposed. She told them that May could not be running in and out of their house in London as she had done in Oldchester; and they must understand she could not take up the time of her aunt's maid in making long journeys to Barnsbury. And she said privately to May—

"Don't get into trouble with your aunt by coming here, my dear. I know you would help us if you could; but you cannot. But I ought not to say that! It is helpful to know you are unchanged, and warm-hearted as ever. Some day, please God, we may be able to see each freely."

"Yes; some day!" cried May joyfully, thinking of him who would help to make that and all the other good things possible. And then she coloured vividly, as though she had betrayed a secret.

Mrs. Bransby, however, did not notice this. She went on pensively, "And yet I am almost afraid to look forward to any pleasant thing lest it should be snatched away from me. Misfortune makes one a sad coward. I have had a disappointment just lately—about Mr. Rivers. He is not coming back so soon as was expected."

"He is coming back at the end of this month," said May in a quick, almost breathless way.

"No. He was to have returned to England at the end of December, but that is altered. His present engagement is prolonged for some weeks. I had a letter from him last evening from Barcelona, and he does not expect to be in England before the latter part of January at the soonest."

May drove homeward much depressed and out of spirits. It was not only that Owen's return was postponed, but that she had not been the first to hear of it! To be sure, his weekly letter was not yet due, and he was rigidly scrupulous in keeping his promise to Mrs. Dobbs about corresponding with May. But need he have volunteered to give this news to Mrs. Bransby before writing it to her? A dull feeling of discontent seemed to oppress her; but on reaching home she tried to shake it off, and to forget it in fighting her friend's battle against Aunt Pauline.

Aunt Pauline had constructed for herself an image of Mrs. Bransby founded on Theodore's hints. She had decided in her own mind that Mrs. Bransby was a weak-minded, lounging, lazy woman, who, no longer able to adorn herself with fine clothes, would sink into slattern-hood, and throw herself and her family as a dead weight on to any shoulders who would carry them.

"A woman belonging to the provincial middle-class, who thinks of nothing but dress," said Mrs. Dormer-Smith, shaking her head mournfully. "One knows what that must come to!"

"But Mrs. Bransby thought of a great many things besides dress!" cried May. "She thought of her household, and her children, and, above all, of her husband."

Mrs. Dormer-Smith merely shook her head again, with an air of mild martyrdom, as though some one were unjustly accusing her.

"And I assure you, Aunt Pauline," May continued, "that the little house she is living in—poor and humble, of course, in comparison with her old home—is a pattern of neatness."

"You say 'poor and humble,' May; but do you not think that a house at forty-five pounds a year is quite as good as she has any right to expect, under the circumstances? I do. And that poor young Bransby has to be responsible for the rent."

"I am sure Mrs. Bransby won't let him be out of pocket, if she can possibly help it."

"I dare say. But she is a sadly unpractical person."

"It was most touching to see her with all those children about her, trying to be cheerful and composed; and looking so lovely in her melancholy mourning dress."

"I presume she wears crape? Ah! There's no more extravagant wear. She might have one dress trimmed with crape for occasions; but her ordinary everyday frocks ought to be of plain black stuff. Hemstitched muslin collars and cuffs, perhaps," added Mrs. Dormer-Smith, relenting at the image of uncompromising ugliness she had herself conjured up. "But they can be made at home, and need not cost much. Has she any lodgers?"

"No, not yet. But there has been very little time. And it is difficult, she says, to find suitable persons."

"Yes, that is precisely the kind of thing one would expect her to say. That is the speech of a thoroughly unpractical person."

"The fact is," burst out May hotly, "it is unpractical to be poor! It is unpractical to be left a widow, with five children, and only a miserable pittance to keep them on!"

It was intolerable to hear Aunt Pauline sitting in judgment on this poor lady, of whom she really knew nothing whatever save her misfortunes. And May was greatly astonished at the glib way in which her aunt, usually so prosaically matter-of-fact, discoursed about Mrs. Bransby, putting in visionary details with a lavish fancy. The girl had yet to learn that the most narrow and commonplace minds are capable of wild exaggeration within their own sphere, and that to be unimaginative is no guarantee for truthfulness of perception.

Mrs. Dormer-Smith, whatever her defects might be, possessed almost perfect gentleness of temper. She merely said softly, "May, May, when will you understand that nothing can be worse form than that habit of raving about people? You are so dreadfully emphatic!"

"I don't care a straw about what you call 'good form'! I prefer good substance," answered May, still in a glow of indignation.

"My dear child, what does this woman matter to you?"

"Matter! She is my friend. She has always been kind to me; and even if she were not my friend, I would defend her against unfair accusations."

Mrs. Dormer-Smith was silent for a few minutes. Then she said, in her slow, somewhat muffled tones, "May, you compel me to say what I would rather leave unsaid. Mrs. Bransby is not the kind of person your uncle and I wish you to associate with. I do not assert that there has been anything positively wrong in her conduct. Now oblige me by listening quietly! If you start up in that melodramatic way, you will bring on one of my nervous headaches. I was merely going to remark that a woman so handsome as I am told she is, and so very much younger than her husband, ought, in the most ordinary view of what is convenable, to avoid anything like—like seeking to attract men's admiration, and that sort of thing. But instead of that, Mrs. Bransby carried on a very flagrant flirtation during her husband's lifetime with a young man considerably her junior. It was noticed, of course, and commented on. If she was so led away by foolish vanity when she had a sensible husband to guide her, what will it be now that she is left to her own devices?"

May stood staring at her aunt like one suddenly awakened out of sleep. "This is all false," she said, after a moment; "false, and very cruel. Who told you such things, Aunt Pauline?"

"I decline to tell you, May. Some one who has had the means of knowing what went on in this Bransby household, and some one whose judgment I can trust. It must suffice to assure you that I am quite certain of my facts." And, strange, as it may seem, Mrs. Dormer-Smith really thought she was certain of them.

May turned away contemptuously. "Mrs. Bransby is really very much to blame," she said. "It is bad enough to be poor and unprotected, but to be the most beautiful woman in all her circle of acquaintance as well, is not to be forgiven!"

Then May left her aunt's presence, and betook herself to her own room, where she locked the door and burst out crying. These calumnies were bewildering. She sat on the side of her bed for more than an hour, in a drooping posture, depressed and miserable. As she thought over her aunt's words, the belief flashed into her mind that Mrs. Dormer-Smith's informant must have been Constance Hadlow. She did not suspect Constance of having deliberately invented stories to the poor widow's discredit; but she did think that Constance had repeated them, and that they had lost none of their venom in her repetition. It chanced that on that very morning her aunt had spoken of a letter just received from Miss Hadlow; and May knew very well the sort of gossip which made up the staple of that correspondence. Not for one moment did her suspicions point to Theodore. The idea that he could have originated odious insinuations against his father's wife was inconceivable to her. But Conny——She had observed latterly a tendency in Conny to bitterness and detraction when speaking of Mrs. Bransby. Was she jealous? And why? When they talked of Mrs. Bransby's flirtations with a man younger than herself, whom did they allude to?

All at once May drew herself sharply into an upright attitude, while a burning flush covered her face and throat. She dashed away some stray tears with her handkerchief, and exclaimed, speaking out loud in her excitement, "I will not think of such mean, malicious, despicable folly! I will turn my mind away from it. It is shameful even to be conscious of anything so base-minded!"