When William reached Deoffam Hall, he found Henry Ashley alone, lying in the drawing-room, the sofa near the open window.

"That's good!" cried he. "Good of the master for sending you, and of you for coming."

"You don't look well to-day," observed William. "Your brow has the old lines of pain in it."

"Thanks to my hip, which is giving me threatening twinges. What's this report about Dare? Is it confirmed?"

"Not absolutely. It was Winthorne told me. Captain Chambers came into the manufactory, and spoke of it this afternoon."

"I dare say it's true," said Henry. "I wonder if Anna Lynn will put on weeds for him?" he sarcastically added.

"Quakers don't wear weeds."

"Teach your grandmother," returned Henry, lapsing into one of those free, popular phrases he indulged in, and was indulged in. "How you stare at me! Do you think I am not cured? Ay; years ago."

"You'd have no objection to see Anna marry, I suppose?"

"She's welcome to marry, for me. You may go and propose to her yourself, if you like. I'll be groomsman at the wedding."

"Would the alliance give you pleasure?"

Henry laughed. "You'd deserve hanging in chains, if you did enter upon it; that's all."

"I have had one wife assigned to me to-day," remarked William.

"Whom may she be?"

"Sophy Glenn."

"Sophy Glenn?"

"Sophy Glenn. Chambers gravely assured me that Helstonleigh had settled the match. He, Chambers, considers that I may go farther and fare worse. Mr. Ashley said the same."

"But what do you say?" cried Henry, rising up on his sofa, and speaking quite sharply.

"I? Oh, I shall consider of it."

At that moment Mary Ashley appeared on the terrace outside; a small basket and a pair of scissors in her hand. Henry called to her. "Are you going to cut more flowers?"

"Yes. Mamma has sent the others away. She said they were fading." Seeing William there, she nodded to him, her colour rising.

"I say, Mary—he has come here to bring some news," went on Henry. "What do you suppose it is?"

"Mamma has told me. About Herbert Dare."

"Not that. He is going to make himself into a respectable man, and marry Sophy Glenn. He came here to announce it. Don't cut too much of that syringa; its sweetness is overpowering in a room."

Mary walked away. William felt excessively annoyed. "You are more dangerous than a child," he exclaimed. "What made you say that?"

And Henry, like a true child, fell back, laughing aloud. "I say, though, comrade, where are you off to?" he called after William, who was leaving the room.

"To cut the flowers for your sister, of course."

But when William reached Mary Ashley, she had apparently forgotten her errand. Standing in a dark spot against the trunk of the acacia tree, her face was white and still, and the basket lay on the ground. She picked it up, and would have hastened away, but William caught her hand and placed it within his arm, little less agitated than she was.

"Not to tell him that news," he whispered. "I did indeed come here, hoping to solicit one to be my wife; but it was not Sophy Glenn. Mary, you cannot mistake what my feelings have long been."

"But—papa?" she gasped, unable to control her emotion.

He looked at her; he made her look at him. What strange, happy light was that in his earnest eyes, causing her heart to bound? "Mr. Ashley sent me to you," he softly whispered.

Henry lay and waited till he was tired. No William; no Mary; no flowers; no anything. Had they both gone to sleep? He arose; and, taking his stick, limped away to see after them. But he searched the flower-garden in vain.

In the sheltered shrubbery, pacing it leisurely, as closely together as they could well be linked, were they; a great deal too much occupied with each other to pay attention to anything else. The basket lay on the ground, empty of all, except the scissors.

"Well, you two are a nice lot for a summer's day!" began Henry, after his old fashion, and using his own astonished eyes. "What of the flowers?"

Mary would have flown, but William held her tightly, and led her up to her brother. He strove to speak jestingly; but his voice betrayed his emotion.

"Henry, shall it be your sister, or Sophy Glenn?"

"So! you have been settling it for yourselves, have you! I would not be in your shoes, Miss Ashley, when the parental thunderbolts shall descend. Was this what you flung Sir Harry over for? There never was any accounting for taste in this world, and there never will be. I ask you where the flowers are, and I should like an answer."

"I will cut them now," said William. "Will you come?" he asked, holding out his arm to Henry.

"No," replied Henry, sitting down on the shrubbery bench, "I must digest this shock first. You two will be enough to cut them, I dare say."

They walked away towards the flower-garden. But ere they had gone many steps he called out; and they turned.

"Mary! before you tie yourself up irrevocably, I hope you will reflect upon the ignominy of his being nothing on earth but a manufacturer. A pretty come down, that, for the Lady Marr who might have been!"

He was in one of his most ironical moods; a sure sign that his inward state was that of glowing satisfaction. This had been his hope for years—his plan, it may be said; but he had kept himself silent and neutral. As he sat there ruminating, he heard the distant sound of the pony carriage; and, taking a short cut, met it in the park. Mr. Ashley handed the reins to his groom, got out, and gave his arm to Henry.

"How are you by this time?"

"Better, sir. Nothing much to brag of."

"I thought William would have been with you. Is he not come?"

"Yes, he is come. But I am second with him to-day. Miss Mary's first."

"Oh indeed!" returned Mr. Ashley.

"They are gone off somewhere, under the pretext of cutting flowers. I don't think the flowers were quite the object, though."

He stole a glance at his father as he spoke. But he gathered nothing. And he dashed at once into the subject he had at heart.

"Father, you will not stand in their light! It will be a crushing blow to both, if you do. Let him have her! There's not a man in the world half as worthy."

But still Mr. Ashley made no rejoinder. Henry scarcely gave him time to make one.

"I have seen it a long time. I have seen how Halliburton kept down his feelings, not being sure of the ground with you. I fear that to-day they must have overmastered him; for he has certainly spoken out. Dear father, don't make two of the best spirits in the world miserable, by withholding your consent!"

"Henry," said Mr. Ashley, turning to him with a smile, "do you fancy William Halliburton is one to have spoken out without my consent?"

Henry's thin cheek flushed. "Did you give it him? Have you already given it him?"

"I gave it him to-day. I drew from him the fact of his attachment to Mary: not telling him in so many words that he should have her, but leaving it for her to decide."

"Then it will be: for I have seen where Miss Mary's love has been. How immeasurably you have relieved me!" continued Henry. "The last half-hour I have been seeing nothing but perplexity and cross-grained guardians."

"Have you?" returned Mr. Ashley. "You should have brought a little common sense to bear upon the subject, Henry."

"But my fear was, sir, that you would not bring the common sense to bear," freely spoke Henry.

"You do not quite understand me. Had I entertained an insuperable objection to Mary's becoming his wife, do you suppose I should have been so wanting in prudence and forethought as to have allowed opportunity for an attachment to ripen? I have long believed that there was no man within the circle of my acquaintance, or without it, so deserving of Mary, except in fortune: therefore I suffered him to come here, with my eyes open as to what might be the result. A very probable result, it has appeared to me. I would forgive any girl who fell in love with William Halliburton."

"And what about ways and means?"

"William's share shall be increased, and Mary will not go to him dowerless. They must live in our house in Helstonleigh; and when we want to go there we must be their guests."

"It will be the working-out of my visions," said Henry in low deep tones. "I have seen them in it in fancy; in that very house; and myself with them, my home when I please. I think you have been planning for me, as much as for them."

"Not exactly, Henry. I have not planned. I have only let things take their course. It will be happier for you, my boy, than if she had gone from us to be Lady Marr."

"Oh! if ever I felt inclined to smother a man, it was that Marr. I never, you know, brought myself to be decently civil to him. There's no answering for the vanity of maidens, and I thought it just possible he might put William's nose out of joint. What will the mother say?"

"The mother will be divided," said Mr. Ashley, a smile crossing his face. "She likes William; but she likes a title. We must allow her a day or two to get over it. I will go and give her the tidings now, if Mary has not done so."

"Mary is with her lovier," returned Henry. "She can't have dragged herself away from him yet."

Mary, however, was not with her "lovier." As Mr. Ashley crossed the hall, he met her. She stopped in hesitation, and coloured vividly.

"Well, Mary, I soon sent you a candidate; though it was in defiance of your express orders. Did I do right?"

Mary burst into tears, and Mr. Ashley drew her face to him. "May God bless your future and his, my child!"

"I am afraid to tell mamma," she sobbed. "I think she will be angry. I could not help liking him."

"Why, that is the very excuse he made to me! Neither can I help liking him, Mary. I will tell mamma."

Mrs. Ashley received the tidings not altogether with equanimity. As Mr. Ashley had surmised, she was divided between conflicting opinions. She liked and admired William; but she equally liked and admired a title and fortune.

"Such a position to relinquish—the union with Sir Harry!"

"Had she married Sir Harry we should have lost her," said Mr. Ashley.

"Lost her!"

"To be sure we should. She would have gone to her new home, twelve miles on the other side of Helstonleigh, amidst her new connections, and have been lost to us, excepting for a formal visit now and then. As it is, we shall keep her; at her old home."

"Yes, there's a great deal to be said on both sides," acknowledged Mrs. Ashley. "What does Henry say?"

"That he thinks I have been planning to secure his happiness. Had Mary married away, we—when we quit this scene—must have left him to his lonely self: now, we shall leave him to them. Things are wisely ordered," impressively added Mr. Ashley: "in this, as in all else. Margaret, let us accept them, and be grateful."

Mrs. Ashley went to seek William. "You will be a loving husband to her," she said with agitation. "You will take care of her and cherish her?"

"With the best endeavours of my whole life," he fervently answered, as he took Mrs. Ashley's hands in his.

It was a happy group that evening. Henry lay on his sofa in complacent ease, Mary drawn down beside him, and William leaning over the back of it, while Mr. and Mrs. Ashley sat at a distance, partially out of hearing.

"Have you heard what the master says?" asked Henry. "He thinks you have been getting up your bargain out of complaisance to me. You are aware, I hope, Mr. William, that whoever takes Mary must take me?"

"I am perfectly willing."

"It is well you are! And—do you know where you are to live?"

William shook his head. "You can understand how all these future considerations have weighed me down," he said, glancing at Mary.

"You are to live at the house in Helstonleigh. It's to be converted into yours by some patent process. The master had an eye to this, I know, when he declined to take out any of the furniture, upon our removal here. The house is to be yours, and the run of it is to be mine; and I shall grumble away to my heart's content at you both. What do you answer to that, Mr. William? I don't ask her; she's nobody."

"I can only answer that the more you run into it, the better pleased we shall be. And we can stand any extent of grumbling."

"I am glad you can. You ought to by this time, for you have been pretty well seasoned to it. So, in the Helstonleigh house, remember, my old rooms are mine; and I intend to be the plague of your lives. After a time—may it be a long time!—I suppose it will be 'Mr. Halliburton of Deoffam Hall.'"

"What nonsense you talk, Henry!"

"Nonsense? I shall make it over to you. Catch me sticking myself out here in solitary state to the admiration of the peacock! What's the matter with you now, you two! Oh, well, if you turn up your noses at Deoffam, it shall never be yours. I'll leave it to the eldest chickabiddy. And mark you, please! I shall have him named 'Ashley,' and stand godfather to him; and, he'll be mine, and not yours. I shall do just as I like with the whole lot, if they count a score, and spoil them as much as I choose."

"What is the matter there?" exclaimed Mrs. Ashley, perceiving a commotion on the sofa.

Mary succeeded in freeing herself, and went away with a crimsoned face. "Mamma, I think Henry must be going out of his mind! He is talking so absurdly."

"Absurdly! Was what I said absurd, William?"

William laughed. "It was premature, at any rate."

Henry stretched up his hands and laid hold of William's. "It is true what Mary says—that I must be going out of my mind. So I am: with joy."

But the report of Herbert Dare's death proved to be a false one.