happiness, echoed it.

"No better thing could have happened from my point of view," he
declared, "for if she'd married anybody else in the world, I should have
been called to say 'good-bye' to her. Since she's chosen you, there's no
necessity for me to do so. I hope you're going on living at North Hill,
and I trust you're going to let me do the same. Of course, it would be
an impossible arrangement if you were dealing with anybody but me; but
since we are what we are in spirit and temper and understanding, I claim
that I may stop. The only difference I can see is this: that whereas at
present, when we dine, you sit between Estelle and me, in future I shall
sit between Estelle and you."

"Not even that," vowed the lover. "Why shouldn't I go on sitting between
you?"

"No--you'll be the head of the house in future."

"The charm of this house is that there's no head to it," said Estelle,
"and Raymond isn't going to usurp any such position just because he
means to marry me."

But distractions broke in upon their happiness. Ernest Churchouse fell
grievously ill and lacked strength to fight disease; while there came
news from Knapp that the farmer was tired of Abel and wished him away.

For their old friend none could prolong his life; in the case of the
boy, Raymond decided that Sabina had better see him and go primed with a
definite offer. Abel's father did not anticipate much more trouble in
that quarter. He guessed that the lad, now in his seventeenth year, was
sufficiently weary of the land and would be glad to take up engineering.
He felt confident that Sabina must find him changed for the better,
prepared for his career and willing to enter upon it without greater
waste of time. He invited the boy's mother to learn if he felt more
friendly to him, and hoped that Abel had now revealed a frame of mind
and a power of reasoning, that would serve to solve the problem of his
career, and finally abolish his animosity to his father.

Sabina went to see her son and heard the farmer first. He was not
unfriendly, but declared Abel a responsibility he no longer desired to
incur.

"He's just at a tricky age--and he's shifty and secret--unlike other
lads. You never know what's going on in his mind, and he never laughs,
or takes pleasure in things. He's too difficult for me, and my wife says
she's frightened of him. As to work, he does it, but you always feel
he's got no love for it. And I know he means to bolt any day. I've