an to any one.'

'Depend upon it, he thinks he is proceeding selon les regles.'

'Then he ought to be flogged! Has he any business to think of my Mary,
without falling red-hot in love with her? Why, Hector was regularly
crazy that last half-year; and dear old Polly is worth ever so much
more than Blanche.'

'I must say you have fulfilled my desire of hearing you talk nonsense,
Ethel. Mary would never think of those transports.'

'She deserves them all the more.'

'Well, she is the party most concerned, though she will be a cruel loss
to all of us.'

'She will not go far, if--'

'Yes, but she will be the worse loss. You simple Ethel, you don't
think that Charles Cheviot will let her be the dear family fag we have
always made of her?'

'Oh no--that always was wrong.'

'And living close by, she will not come on a visit, all festal, to
resume home habits. No, you must make up your mind, Ethel--_if,_ as
you say, _if_--he will be a man for monopolies, and he will resent
anything that he thinks management from you. I suspect it is a real
sign of the love that you deny, that he has ventured on the sister of a
clever woman, living close by, and a good deal looked up to.'

'Flora, Flora, you should not make one wicked. If she is to be happy,
why can't you let me rejoice freely, and only have her drawn off from
me bit by bit, in the right way of nature?'

'I did not tell you to make you dislike it--of course not. Only I
thought that a little tact, a little dexterity, might prevent Charles
Cheviot from being so much afraid of you, as if he saw at once how
really the head of the family you are.'

'Nonsense, Flora, I am no such thing. If I am domineering, the sooner
any one sees it and takes me down the better. If this does come, I
will try to behave as I ought, and not to mind so Mary is happy; but I
can't act, except just as the moment leads me. I hope it will soon be
over, now you have made me begin to believe in it. I am afraid it will
spoil Harry's pleasure at home! Poor dear Harry, what will he do?'

'When does he come?'

'Any day now; he could not quite tell when he could get away.

When they came back, and Dr. May ran out to say, 'Can you come in.
Flora? we want you,' the sisters doubted whether his excitement were
due to the crisis, or to the arrival. He hurried them into the study,
and shut the door, exulting and perplexed. 'You girls leave one no
rest,' he said. 'Here I have had this young