t Alma clung to life. Harvey had thought she would ask for her
little son, and expend upon him the love called forth by her dead baby;
she seemed, however, to care even less for Hughie than before. And,
after all, the bitter experience had made little change in her.

CHAPTER 7

Since the removal from Pinner, Rolfe had forgotten his anxieties with
regard to money. Expenses were reduced; not very greatly, but to a
point which made all the difference between just exceeding his income
and living just within it. He had not tried to economise, and would
scarcely have known how to begin; it was the change in Alma's mode of
life that brought about this fortunate result. With infinite
satisfaction he dismissed from his mind the most hateful of all worries.

It looked, too, as if the business in Westminster Bridge Road might
eventually give a substantial return for the money he had invested in
it. Through the winter, naturally, little trade was done; but with
springtime things began to look brisk and hopeful. Harvey had applied
himself seriously to learning the details of the business; he was no
longer a mere looker-on, but could hold practical counsel with his
partner, make useful suggestions, and help in carrying them out.

In the sixth month after her father's decease, Rolfe enjoyed the
privilege of becoming acquainted with Miss Winter. Morphew took him one
afternoon to the house at Earl's Court, where the widow and her
daughter were still living, the prospect of Henrietta's marriage having
made it not worth while for them to change their abode in the interim.
With much curiosity, with not a little mistrust, Harvey entered the
presence of these ladies, whose names and circumstances had been so
familiar to him for years. Henrietta proved to be very unlike the image
he had formed of her. Anticipating weakness, conventionality, and some
affectation, he was surprised to meet a lady of simple, grave manners;
nervous at first, but soon perfectly self-possessed; by no means
talkative, but manifesting in every word a well-informed mind and a
habit of reflection. It astonished him that such a man as Cecil Morphew
should have discovered his ideal in Henrietta Winter; it perplexed him
yet more that Cecil's attachment should have been reciprocated.

Mrs. Winter was a very ordinary person; rather pretentious, rather too
fluent of speech, inclined to fretfulness, and probably of trying
temper. Having for many years lived much be