ure. If I gain strength I think it likely enough we may travel
on the Continent for a time. The girls have never been abroad and the
prospect would go a long way towards reconciling them entirely to the
change."

"I think that a very good plan," Cuthbert said. "I was intending to call
upon the doctor on my way down and he will at once set the ball
rolling."

Mr. Brander went to the door where the fly had been waiting for two
hours.

"God bless you!" he said. "I cannot tell you how deeply grateful I am to
you for your forbearance and generosity."

"Don't worry any more about it, Mr. Brander," Cuthbert said, as he shook
his hand, "it has been a temporary change, and good rather than bad has
come of it. Believe me, I shall put the matter out of my mind
altogether."

"Back again, Cuthbert," the doctor said, when he was shown into the
consulting-room. "I was down just now at the station to see a man off,
and the station-master said you had arrived by the 11.30 train, and that
he had seen you drive off in a fly. I could hardly believe it, but as
you are here in person I suppose that there can be no mistake about it.
Of course you have been up to Brander's again?"

"I have, Doctor, and for the last time. That is, the next time I shall
go up it will be to take possession of Fairclose."

"My dear lad, I am delighted," the doctor said, shaking him heartily by
the hand, "how has this miracle come about?"

"I cannot give you all the details, Doctor. I will simply give you the
facts, which, by the way, I shall be glad if you will retail to your
patients for public consumption," and he then repeated the statement
that he had arranged with Mr. Brander that he should make.

"And that is the tale you wish me to disseminate?" the doctor said, with
a twinkle of his eye, when Cuthbert concluded.

"That is the statement, Doctor, and it has the merit of being, as far as
it goes, true. What the nature of the illegality of this sale was, I am
not at liberty to disclose, not even to you, but I have discovered that
beyond all question it was irregular and invalid, and Brander and I have
come to a perfectly amicable understanding. I may tell you that to
prevent the trouble inseparable even from a friendly lawsuit he assigns
the property to me as Mary's dowry, and as a sort of recognition of the
fact that he acted without sufficient care in advising my father to take
those shares in the bank. Thus all necessity for the reopening of byg