und.
"They will not venture into the night air. Sometimes I think they will
drive me mad--Isabella and Georgina."

"Mary!" cried a shrill voice from the drawing-room, "how can you be so
imprudent! John, how can you allow her!"

John stepped back to the window. "It is very mild," he said. "Lady
Mary likes the air."

There was a note of authority in his tone which somehow impressed Lady
Belstone, who withdrew, muttering to herself, into the warm lamplight
of the drawing-room.

Perhaps the two old ladies were to be pitied, too, as they sat
together, but forlorn, sincerely shocked and uneasy at their
sister-in-law's behaviour.

"Dear Timothy not dead three months, and she sitting out there in the
night air, as he would never have permitted, talking and laughing;
yes, I actually hear her laughing--with John."

"There is no telling what she may do _now_," said Miss Crewys,
gloomily.

"I declare it is a judgment, Georgina. Why did Timothy choose to trust
a perfect stranger--even though John is a cousin--with the care of his
wife and son, and his estate, rather than his own sisters?"

"It was a gentleman's work," said Miss Crewys.

"Gentleman's fiddlesticks! Couldn't old Crawley have done it? I
should hope he is as good a lawyer as young John any day," said Lady
Belstone, tossing her head. "But I have often noticed that people will
trust any chance stranger with the property they leave behind, rather
than those they know best."

"Isabella," said Miss Crewys, "blame not the dead, and especially on a
moonlight night. It makes my blood run cold."

"I am blaming nobody, Georgina; but I will say that if poor Timothy
thought proper to leave everything else in the hands of young John, he
might have considered that you and I had a better right to the Dower
House than poor dear Mary, who, of course, must live with her son."

"I am far from wishing or intending to leave my home here, Isabella,"
said Miss Crewys. "It is very different in your case. You forfeited
the position of daughter of the house when you married. But I have
always occupied my old place, and my old room."

This was a sore subject. On Lady Belstone's return as a widow, to the
home of her fathers, she had been torn with anxiety and indecision
regarding her choice of a sleeping apartment. Sentiment dictated her
return to her former bedroom; but she was convinced that the married
state required a domicile on the first floor. Etiquette prevailed,
and she d