Missy maun just sit i' her ain corner, an' read her book, an' tak' her cup o' tea."

And nobody but Missy herself knew what the edict

meant.

CHAPTER XV.

IS HE IN GALLOWA ALANE?"

"It were better to have no opinion of God at all, than such an opinion as is unworthy of Him; for the one is unbelief, the other is contumely."-BACON.

Week after week passed, and but slow steps had been made towards re-establishing the strength of the patient.

It is probable that all the wear and tear undergone by a system originally delicate, previous to the rupture of the blood-vessel, had now its effect in preventing a more speedy recovery. Before her illness Kate had been at a low ebb,living on excitement, on feverish joys and sorrows,-exerting herself by day and lying awake by night,-wearing out her frame with mental emotions and bodily exercise, and taking neither the support of rest nor of proper food.

Time alone could repair the mischief done.

"And indeed," said Lady Olivia, as she lay back in her barouche at Brighton, and thought how convenient it was that Kate should have been prescribed the strictest quiet and seclusion at the very time that Marjorie had been ordered sea-air,"indeed, my dear Lady Julia, the whole arrangement is quite Providential. Our poor invalid is as well off as she could, by any possibility, be under the circumstances. The most excellent people to stay with, who quite devote themselves to her comfort; the best of doctors; and two nurses, one or other of whom never leaves her. Think what it would have been if my step-daughter had been taken ill at do look at that frightful bonnet, dear; did you ever see such a deformity? And, by the way, the girls want some things; we had better drive to Hannington's. Oh, it is quite a relief to my mind to think that my poor dear Kate is so well taken care of."

Brighton was full, and nothing could be pleasanter than

to drive from shop to shop, choosing novelties of every kind; to take a turn next along the cliffs, and drop in to have a cup of tea at one house or another on the

way home. Lady Olivia had not enjoyed herself so much since the spring-time in Edinburgh; and that her husband, on this occasion, remained at Carnochan, did not interfere with her peace of mind. She had him fast there he was hers now, for better, for worse; and she beamed upon the world as Lady Olivia Newbattle, a fresh young married woman, with two dear little girls,-quite a different person from the waning Lady Olivia Evelyn, with nothing new nor interesting about her.

She thought it an excellent arrangement that she should bring with her Bertha and Marjorie, accompanied by their governess, and that Alice should stay behind with her father.

Alice, who thirsted to be once more supreme in the mansion where she had reigned so long, and who knew nothing of what she renounced, never having been at a gay wateringplace in its season, was moved perhaps, in this instance, more by ignorance than pliability. Whilst her step-mother was communing with herself as to how she could induce this young lady, who was always thinking of the world and its charms, to renounce the present opportunity for entering upon them, Alice, whose eyes were fixed on London, and who knew nothing of Brighton, was, with equal inward perturbation, reckoning up the pros and cons of her being permitted to remain where she was.

Both endeavoured to conceal their pleasure when an agreement was eventually arrived at. "If you wish it, my dear," said Lady Olivia, with emphasis, "and if your father approves, I have nothing further to say. I am willing to take you; but if you prefer to stay, it is your own affairor rather, it is for your father to decide."

"I could not think of leaving papa all alone.”

Probably she knew what she was about. The winter months at Carnochan had no terrors for one who was but too well used to them; and with carriages, horses, servants, and her father once more at her disposal, she wanted no fairer prospect. Lady Olivia had engaged for her being taken out in the spring; and since she could tell Susie Popham so, and dwell on the theme in her own mind with certainty, she was content to wait, and resume once more

the life she had been leading up to the time of her father's second marriage. It was delightful to sit at the head of the table again.

Permission from Mr Newbattle was further obtained for a friend to be invited, to whom Alice was in her way attached,—a girl who in no wise interfered with whatsoever she chose to do, say, or appear-one to whom the pretty young Miss Newbattle was an object of sincerest admiration and involuntary flattery.

Sophia Wilkinson was delighted to come, so all was right; and it must be confessed, that with two nice young companions always in good-humour, and with the absence of every annoyance (which was insured by giving them their own way in everything), there came a wonderful sense of peace and quiet into poor Mr Newbattle's life.

His plan for transferring every trouble on to a wife's shoulders had not exactly answered.

Before Kate was got rid of, the vexatious girl would accept no dictum except from his own lips; and to him Lady Olivia had frequently to refer with dilated eyes, both in and out of his children's presence. And even Kate's ejection, though it had brought relief for the time, had not effected all that he had been led to expect.

There was still the wrangle about the post-bag in the morning, and the nuisance of having to open it himself, because his lady would not sit by and see it handed to his daughter, and Alice made a fuss about its being carried past to Lady Olivia's empty chair. Lady Olivia talked of "sitting by and seeing it taken" to Alice; but the fact was, that her ladyship was but rarely down when the letters

came.

What, then, was to be done?

He himself was the proper person to give out the correspondence, his wife asserted; and his lame response that hitherto it had been always done for him, served him in no stead.

He did not know where the key was.

Well, Alice could keep the key, and hand it to him when the bag came in.

It ended in this, that sometimes one, and sometimes another, went through the ceremonial; that the grey-headed butler, who had grown used to bring it to Miss Newbattle, doggedly refused to remember he was to do so no longer;

that father and daughter connived, whenever they durst, at his disobedience; that there was a perpetual bustle and secrecy, an affectation of innocence, and thrusting of the great leather pouch under the table, if in the wrong quarter, when the rustle of Lady Olivia's train was heard; and that he was glad when the nuisance was over, every day of his life. He hated letters at all times,—they were no good to anybody,—and he would willingly, but for his newspaper, have made an arrangement to have them delivered only twice a week.

Now he could get his newspaper in peace, and not be forced to give heed to sheets of trash first,-since his daughter, who had passed all her life with him, naturally understood that he was not to be pestered. None of them had ever expected papa to listen to a letter before Lady Olivia came, and they could not help giggling to each other occasionally at the squire's rueful face under the daily infliction. He could not make his new wife understand his old ways.

The tea - making had also been a fruitful source of division.

He had either to wait and wait for his cup at breakfast, and get it harsh and bitter from standing too long, in the end,-or he had to undergo a quick look, an "Oh, you have got your tea? I hope it is right, I hope you have enough sugar? I was hurrying as fast as I possibly could to get down, but you have been beforehand with me."

Certainly Lady Olivia's move to Brighton was not altogether a source of regret.

He got Alice to let him know what they were going to have for dinner, as he had done in other Decembers, when time hung heavy on his hands. He did not put on dressclothes of an evening. He slept in his arm-chair as long as he chose.

His daughter had no need to exaggerate―and accordingly she did not do so-when she triumphantly informed the absentees that papa and she were getting on as well as possible, and that papa was quite glad that they should stay away another fortnight, or as long as Lady Olivia liked.

It suited Lady Olivia to stay away; but she did not, naturally, relish having the leave thus granted. She might enjoy her lively afternoons along the shore, and declare there was no place in the world to compare to Brighton in the early winter, and think of Carnochan in her own mind

with a positive shudder of distaste; but she was not altogether pleased to be permitted to absent herself for as long as ever she liked. She laid it by in her own mind, that it would be as well to have Madam Alice out of the way as soon as it could be done. By hook or by crook, the young lady should be presented, introduced, and married the fol lowing summer, since it would never do to let her get the thin end of the wedge in at Carnochan again.

Bertha and Marjorie, Lady Olivia found tractable enough under Mademoiselle's supervision,-all three being enchanted with the change, and the novelty of being among crowds of people, and carriages, and shops, at a time of year which, to the young ones at least, brought recollections of nothing but dreary monotony, one dull grey sky rolling over their heads after another, lessons and walks unbroken by any variety, and rabbits every day for the early dinner.

Mademoiselle little knew what she escaped by missing that mid-day meal at Carnochan in December. Naturally, it was the first to suffer from the end of the game seasonand the barrenness of the garden and the poultry-yard; and although, under the new régime, we cannot say but that matters might have mended, since Lady Olivia was a luncheon-eater, it certainly, so far, bore to the minds of Bertha and Marjorie no other interpretation than that of pies and parsnips.

Kate, at the Muirland Farm, fared a great deal better.

On the little table by her side the daintiest of dishes, contrived with skill born of tender thought and care, were daily to be found. No trouble was too great to be taken either by the farmer in collecting the materials, or by his wife in cooking them. Of wild-duck, woodcock, and such dainties, sent in by the Castle Kenrick factor, with whom Mr Comline was at this time most particular friends, the larder was never empty; and they were done to a turn-they were uncovered smoking on rounds of toast by Missy's arm-chair.

"Let the lass there serve my young leddy!" exclaimed the worthy dame one day, a neighbour having expressed surprise at finding Mistress Comline on her knees before the fire, toasting-fork in hand. "My certie, no! Nor Lizzie neither. Lizzie has nae likin' for cookery-wark. Ilka bit and sup Miss Kate takes is frae my hand-I can tell ye that, mistress; and little wad I grudge to be ower the pans a' day lang, an she wad eat what she gets, puir thing!"