on
was not over; and she knew also that it would be vain for her to
endeavour to begin another subject. Nor could she think of anything
else to say, so much was she agitated.

"What makes you suppose that Mr. Belton would be so liberal?" asked
Mrs. Winterfield.

"I don't know. I can't say. He is the nearest relation I shall have;
and of all the people I ever knew he is the best, and the most
generous, and the least selfish. When he came to us papa was quite
hostile to him--disliking his very name; but when the time came, papa
could not bear to think of his going, because he had been so good."

"Clara!"

"Well, aunt."

"I hope you know my affection for you."

"Of course I do, aunt; and I hope you trust mine for you also."

"Is there anything between you and Mr. Belton besides cousinship?"

"Nothing."

"Because if I thought that, my trouble would of course be at an end."

"There is nothing;--but pray do not let me be a trouble to you."
Clara, for a moment, almost resolved to tell her aunt the whole
truth; but she remembered that she would be treating her cousin badly
if she told the story of his rejection.

There was another short period of silence, and then Mrs. Winterfield
went on. "Frederic thinks that I should make some provision for you
by will. That, of course, is the same as though he offered to do it
himself. I told him that it would be so, and I read him my will last
night. He said that that made no difference, and recommended me to
add a codicil. I asked him how much I ought to give you, and he said
fifteen hundred pounds. There will be as much as that after burying
me without burden to the estate. You must acknowledge that he has
been very generous."

But Clara, in her heart, did not at all thank Captain Aylmer for
his generosity. She would have had everything from him, or nothing.
It was grievous to her to think that she should owe to him a bare
pittance to keep her out of the workhouse,--to him who had twice
seemed to be on the point of asking her to share everything with him.
She did not love her cousin Will as she loved him; but her cousin
Will's assurance to her that he would treat her with a brother's
care was sweeter to her by far than Frederic Aylmer's well-balanced
counsel to his aunt on her behalf. In her present mood, too, she
wanted no one to have forethought for her; she desired no provision;
for her, in the discomfiture of heart, there was consolation in the
feeling that when she