hould you say to my bringing him
here?

'I believe it would make you happy,' said Isabel. 'Oh! yes, pray
do--and then we should have Clara.'

'I should rejoice to offer anything like reparation, though I do not
dare to hope it will be granted; and I do not know how to ask you to
break up the home comfort we have prized so much.'

'It will be all the better comfort for your mind being fully at ease;
and I am sure we should deserve none at all, if we shut our door
against him now that he is in distress. You must bring him, poor old
man, and I will try with all my might to behave well to him.'

'It is a mere chance; but I am glad to take your consent with me. As to
our affording it, I suppose he may have, at the worst, an allowance
from the creditors, so you will not have to retrench anything.'

'Don't talk of that, dearest. We never knew how little we could live
on till we tried; and if No. 12 is taken, and you are paid for the new
edition of the lectures, and Walter's pay besides--'

'And Sir Hubert,' added James.

'Of course we shall get on,' said Isabel. 'I am not in the least
afraid that the little girls will suffer, if they do live a little
harder for the sake of their old uncle. I only wish you had had your
new black coat first, for I am afraid you won't now.'

'You need not reckon on that. I don't expect that I shall be allowed
the comfort of doing anything for him. But see about them I must. Oh,
may I not be too late!'

Early the next morning James was on his way, travelling through the
long bright summer day; and when, after the close, stifling railway
carriage, full of rough, loud-voiced passengers, he found himself in
the cool of the evening on the bare heath, where the slanting sunbeams
cast a red light, he was reminded by every object that met his eye of
the harsh and rebellious sensations that he had allowed to reign over
him at his last arrival there, which had made him wrangle over the bier
of one so loving and beloved, and exaggerate the right till it wore the
semblance of the wrong.

By the time he came to the village, the parting light was shining on
the lofty church tower, rising above the turmoil and whirl of the
darkening world below, almost as sacred old age had lifted his
grandmother into perpetual peace and joy, above the fret and vexation
of earthly cares and dissensions. The recollection of her confident
trust that reconciliation was in store, came to cheer him as he crossed