while a
certain tenderness for poor Gregorio's memory, or perhaps for the
exposure of his own carelessness, made Mr. Egremont reluctant. There
was also a proposal, brought forward with much diffidence from Mr.
Condamine's mother, to rent Bridgefield House, but on this, as well as
respecting a successor to the bailiff, Mr. Egremont was to give his
answer the next day, when Mr. Bulfinch would call again.

Nuttie was thankful for the business that had filled up the hour after
luncheon, when Alwyn used to play in the drawing-room and delight his
father; but she was feeling desperate to have the crisis over, and
resolved to speak when she went out driving with him. It was he,
however, who began. 'I sounded Mark's wife yesterday, Ursula. She is
a nice little thing enough, and a good wife in her way.'

'A very good wife.'

'Except when she persuaded him to turn up his nose at the agency. D'ye
think he would take it now, since he has tasted the sweets of his
umbrella business?' then, as Nuttie paused, taken by surprise; 'Five
hundred a year and the Home Farm would be better than, what is it, a
hundred and fifty and a floor over a warehouse! I don't like to see
old Will's son wearing himself out there, and the lad is a good honest
lad, with business habits, who would do justice to you after I am gone.'

'Father,' said Nuttie, trembling with the effort, 'I want you to do
something better than that. I want you to let Mark take the agency
with a view to himself--not me. Let him be as he would have been if he
had never hunted us up at Micklethwayte, and put me in his place.'

'Eh!' said Mr. Egremont. 'It is not entailed--worse luck; if it had
been, I should not have been bound to dance attendance at the heels of
such an old sinner as the General.'

'No, but it ought to go to the heir male, and keep in the old name.
Think--there have been Egremonts at Bridgefield for four hundred years!'

'Very pretty talk, but how will it be with you, Miss. We shall have
Fane, and I don't know how many more, coming after the scent of
Bridgefield now,' he said with a heavy sigh, ending with a bitter 'Hang
them all!'

'And welcome,' said Nuttie, answering the thought rather than the
words. 'Father, I wanted to tell you--'

'You don't mean that any one has been after you at such a time as
this!' he cried.

'It was before--I mean it was the evening when we were all so glad,
before we began to be afraid.'

'The umbrella man! By J