y.

"I await my family's congratulations," she said, with her head in the
air. "Mr. Raffles Haw has been here, and he has asked me to be his
wife."

"The deuce he did!" cried the old man. "And you said--?"

"I am to see him again."

"And you will say--?"

"I will accept him."

"You were always a good girl, Laura," said old McIntyre, standing on his
tiptoes to kiss her.

"But Laura, Laura, how about Hector?" asked Robert in mild remonstrance.

"Oh, I have written to him," his sister answered carelessly. "I wish you
would be good enough to post the letter."

CHAPTER X. THE GREAT SECRET.

And so Laura McIntyre became duly engaged to Raffles Haw, and old
McIntyre grew even more hungry-looking as he felt himself a step nearer
to the source of wealth, while Robert thought less of work than ever,
and never gave as much as a thought to the great canvas which still
stood, dust-covered, upon his easel. Haw gave Laura an engagement ring
of old gold, with a great blazing diamond bulging out of it. There was
little talk about the matter, however, for it was Haw's wish that all
should be done very quietly. Nearly all his evenings were spent at
Elmdene, where he and Laura would build up the most colossal schemes of
philanthropy for the future. With a map stretched out on the table in
front of them, these two young people would, as it were, hover over the
world, planning, devising, and improving.

"Bless the girl!" said old McIntyre to his son; "she speaks about it as
if she were born to millions. Maybe, when once she is married, she won't
be so ready to chuck her money into every mad scheme that her husband
can think of."

"Laura is greatly changed," Robert answered; "she has grown much more
serious in her ideas."

"You wait a bit!" sniggered his father. "She is a good girl, is Laura,
and she knows what she is about. She's not a girl to let her old dad go
to the wall if she can set him right. It's a pretty state of things," he
added bitterly: "here's my daughter going to marry a man who thinks no
more of gold than I used to of gun-metal; and here's my son going about
with all the money he cares to ask for to help every ne'er-do-well in
Staffordshire; and here's their father, who loved them and cared for
them, and brought them both up, without money enough very often to buy
a bottle of brandy. I don't know what your poor dear mother would have
thought of it."

"You have only to ask for what you want."

"Yes