"I have nothing further to say," continued his uncle.

"But we shall part in friendship, shall we not?" said George. "I have
so much to thank you for, that I cannot bear that you should be angry
with me now."

"You are an ass--a fool!"

"You should look on that as my misfortune, sir." And then he paused a
moment. "I will leave you now, shall I?"

"Yes, and send Mary up."

"But I may come down again to-morrow?"

"What! haven't they a bed for you in the house?"

Bertram hummed and hawed, and said he did not know. But the
conference ended in his promising to stay there. So he went up to
town, and returned again bringing down his carpet bag, and preparing
to remain till all should be over.

That was a strange household which was now collected together in the
house at Hadley. The old man was lying upstairs, daily expecting
his death; and he was attended, as it was seemly that he should be,
by his nearest relatives. His brother's presence he would not have
admitted; but his grandchild was there, and his nephew, and her whom
he had always regarded as his niece. Nothing could be more fitting
than this. But not the less did Caroline and George feel that it was
not fitting that they should be together.

And yet the absolute awkwardness of the meeting was soon over. They
soon found themselves able to sit in the same room, conversing on the
one subject of interest which the circumstances of the moment gave,
without any allusion to past times. They spoke only of the dying
man, and asked each other questions only about him. Though they were
frequently alone together while Miss Baker was with Mr. Bertram,
they never repeated the maddening folly of that last scene in Eaton
Square.

"She has got over it now," said Bertram to himself; and he thought
that he rejoiced that it was so. But yet it made his heart sad.

It has passed away like a dream, thought Lady Harcourt; and now he
will be happy again. And she, too, strove to comfort herself in
thinking so; but the comfort was very cold.

And now George was constantly with his uncle. For the first two
days nothing further was said about money. Mr. Bertram seemed to be
content that matters should rest as they were then settled, and his
nephew certainly had no intention of recurring to the subject on
his own behalf. The old man, however, had become much kinder in his
manner to him--kinder to him than to any one else in the house; and
exacted from him various little promises