r,"
said John, glad of some way to get rid of his excitement; "but I do not
think that even he would sell his wife and his child for money. I
wouldn't do him so much discredit as that."

"Oh, I beg your pardon, John," Mrs. Dennistoun said.

CHAPTER XXVI.

John left the Cottage next morning with the full conduct of the affairs
of the family placed in his hands. The ladies were both a little
doubtful if his plan was the best--they were still frightened for what
might happen, and kept up a watch, as John perceived, fearing every
step that approached, trembling at every shadow. They remembered many
stories, such as rush to the minds of persons in trouble, of similar
cases, of the machinations of the bad father whose only object was to
overcome and break down his wife, and who stole his child away to let it
languish and die. There are some circumstances in which people forget
all the shades of character, and take it for granted that a man who can
go wrong in one matter will act like a very demon in all. This was
doubly strong in Mrs. Dennistoun, a woman full of toleration and
experience; but the issues were so momentous to her, and the possible
results so terrible, that she lost her accustomed good sense. It was
more natural, perhaps, that Elinor, who was weak in health and still
full of the arbitrariness of youth, should entertain this fear--without
considering that Phil was the very last man in the world to burden
himself with an infant of the most helpless age--which seemed to John
an almost quite unreasonable one. Almost--for, of course, he too was
compelled to allow, when driven into a corner, that there was nothing
that an exasperated man might not do. Elinor had come down early to see
her cousin before he left the house, bringing with her in her arms the
little bundle of muslin and flannel upon the safety of which her very
life seemed to depend. John looked at it, and at the small pink face and
unconscious flickering hands that formed the small centre to all those
wrappings, with a curious mixture of pity and repugnance. It was like
any other blind new-born kitten or puppy, he thought, but not so
amusing--no, it was not blind, to be sure. At one moment, without any
warning, it suddenly opened a pair of eyes, which by a lively exercise
of fancy might be supposed like Elinor's, and seemed to look him in the
face, which startled him very much, with a curious notification of the
fact that the thing was not a ki