s with Brackenhill were few and far between. From the local
papers Alfred heard of the rejoicings when James came of age, quickly
followed by the announcement that he had gone abroad for the winter. Then
he was at home again, and going to marry Miss Harriet Benham; whereat
Alfred smiled a little. "The governor must have put his pride in his
pocket: old Benham made his money out of composite candles, then retired,
and has gas all over the house for fear they should be mentioned. Harry, as
we used to call her, is the youngest of them--she must be eight or nine and
twenty; fine girl, hunts--tried it on with poor Maurice ages ago. I should
think she was about half as big again as Jim. Well, yes, perhaps I am
exaggerating a little. How charmed my father must be!--only, of course,
anything to please Jim, and it's a fine thing to have him married and
settled."

Alfred read his father's feelings correctly enough, but Mr. Thorne was
almost repaid for all he had endured when, in his turn, he was able to
write and announce the birth of a boy for whom the bells had been set
ringing as the heir of Brackenhill. Jim, with his sick fancies and
querulous conceit, Mrs. James Thorne, with her coarsely-colored splendor
and imperious ways, faded into the background now that Horace's little star
had risen.

The rest may be briefly told. Horace had a little sister who died, and he
himself could hardly remember his father. His time was divided between his
mother's house at Brighton and Brackenhill. He grew slim and tall and
handsome--a Thorne, and not a Benham, as his grandfather did not fail to
note. He was delicate. "But he will outgrow that," said Mrs. Middleton, and
loved him the better for the care she had to take of him. It was
principally for his sake that she was there. She was a widow and had no
children of her own, but when, at her brother's request, she came to
Brackenhill to make more of a home for the school-boy, she brought with her
a tiny girl, little Sissy Langton, a great-niece of her husband's.

Meanwhile, the other boy grew up in his quiet home, but death came there as
well as to Brackenhill, and seemed to take the mainspring of the household
in taking Sarah Thorne. Her father pined for her, and had no pleasure in
life except in her child. Even when the old man was growing feeble, and it
was manifest to all but the boy that he would not long be parted from his
daughter, it was a sombre but not an unhappy home for the child.