le's misfortune," she admitted candidly, "though
none of you speak of it, and I noticed Oliver stammer dreadfully when
Mrs. Maxwell mentioned Mr. Jardine; but I thought that at this time of
day, when everybody knew there was no malice borne originally, and Uncle
Crawfurd might have been killed, you might have been polite and
neighbourly with quiet consciences. I tell you, I mean to set my cap at
young Mr. Jardine of Whitethorn, and when I marry him, and constitute
him a family connexion, of course the relics of that old accident will
be scattered to the winds."

"Oh! Polly, Polly!" cried the girls, "you must never, never speak so
lightly to papa."

"Of course not, I am not going to vex my uncle; I can excuse him,
but Joanna need not look so scared. There is not such a thing as
retribution and vengeance, child, in Christian countries; it is you
who are heathenish. Or have you nursed a vain imagination of
encountering Mr. Jardine, unknown to each other, and losing your
hearts by an unaccountable fascination, and being as miserable as
the principals in the second last chapter of one of Conny's three
volumes? or were you to atone to him in some mysterious, fantastic,
supernatural fashion, for the unintentional wrong? Because if you have
done so, I'm afraid it is all mist and moonshine, poor Jack, quite as
much as the twaddling goody stories."

"Polly," said Joanna angrily, but speaking low, "I think you might spare
us on so sad a subject."

"I want you to have common sense; I want you to be comfortable; no
wonder my uncle has never recovered his spirits."

"Indeed, Polly, I don't think you've any reason to interfere in
papa's concerns."

"I don't see that you are entitled to blame Joanna," defended sister
Lilias, stoutly;--Lilias, who was so swift to find fault herself.

"There, I'll say no more; I beg your pardon, I merely intended to show
you your world in an ordinary light."

"Do you know, Polly, that Mrs. Jardine has never visited us since?"
asked Susan.

"Very likely, she was entitled to some horror. But she is a reasonable
woman. Mr. Maxwell told me--every third party discusses the story behind
your backs whenever it chances to come up, I warn you--Mr. Maxwell
informed me that she never blamed Uncle Crawfurd, and that she sent her
son away from her because she judged it bad for him to be brought up
among such recollections, and feared that when he was a lad he might be
tampered with by the servants, and mi