in new unsettled places; but there had hardly been an ailment
in the Muller family since they had settled at Massissauga.

And Averil's last murmur was--Could he find out anything about other
people's opinion of the speculation? did they know enough about Mr.
Muller to trust themselves entirely in his hands?

Henry was almost angry--Could not his sister trust him to take all
reasonable precaution? It was the old story of prejudice against
whatever he took up.

Poor Averil was disarmed directly. The combats of will and their
consequences rose up before her, and with them Leonard's charges to
devote herself to Henry. She could but avow herself willing to do
whatever he pleased. She only hoped he would be careful.

All thenceforth was pleasant anticipation and hope. Averil's property
had to be transferred to America, and invested in shares of the land at
Massissauga; but this was to cause no delay in arranging for the
removal, they were only to wait until the winter had broken up, and the
roads become passable after the melting of the snows; and meantime Mr.
Muller was to have their house prepared. Cora would remain and
accompany them, and in the intervening time promised to assist Averil
with her judgment in making the necessary purchases for 'stepping
westward.'

When Averil wrote their plans to her English friends, she felt the
difficulty of pleading for them. She was sensible that at Stoneborough
the risking of her property would be regarded as folly on her part, and
something worse on that of her brother; and she therefore wrote with
every effort to make the whole appear her own voluntary act--though the
very effort made her doubly conscious that the sole cause for her
passive acquiescence was, that her past self-will in trifles had left
her no power to contend for her own opinion in greater matters--the
common retribution on an opinionative woman of principle.

Moreover, it was always with an effort that she wrote to Mary May. A
rejected offer from a brother is a rock in a correspondence with a
sister, and Averil had begun to feel greatly ashamed of the manner of
her own response. Acceptance would have been impossible; but
irritating as had been Tom May's behaviour, insulting as had been his
explanation, and provoking, his pertinacity, she had begun to feel that
the impulse had been too generous and disinterested to deserve such
treatment, and that bitterness and ill-temper had made her lose all
softn