t long or receive wide credence.
When it was hinted to such old friends as Sir Peter Mancrudy and Mrs.
MacHugh, they laughed it to scorn,--and it did not exist even in the
vague form of an undivulged mystery for above three days. Then it
was asserted that old Barty had been found to have no real claim
to any share in the bank, and that he was to be turned out at Miss
Stanbury's instance;--that he was to be turned out, and that Brooke
had been acknowledged to be the owner of the Burgess share of her
business. Then came the fact that old Barty had been bought out, and
that the future husband of Miss Stanbury's niece was to be the junior
partner. A general feeling prevailed at last that there had been
another great battle between Miss Stanbury and old Barty, and that
the old maid had prevailed now as she had done in former days.

Before the end of July the papers were in the lawyer's hands, and
all the terms had been fixed. Brooke came down again and again, to
Dorothy's great delight, and displayed considerable firmness in the
management of his own interest. If Fate intended to make him a banker
in Exeter instead of a clerk in the Ecclesiastical Commission Office,
he would be a banker after a respectable fashion. There was more
than one little struggle between him and Mr. Julius Cropper, which
ended in accession of respect on the part of Mr. Cropper for his new
partner. Mr. Cropper had thought that the establishment might best
be known to the commercial world of the West of England as "Croppers'
Bank;" but Brooke had been very firm in asserting that if he was to
have anything to do with it the old name should be maintained.

"It's to be 'Cropper and Burgess,'" he said to Dorothy one afternoon.
"They fought hard for 'Cropper, Cropper, and Burgess;'--but I
wouldn't stand more than one Cropper."

"Of course not," said Dorothy, with something almost of scorn in
her voice. By this time Dorothy had gone very deeply into banking
business.

CHAPTER LXXXIX.

"I WOULDN'T DO IT, IF I WAS YOU."

Miss Stanbury at this time was known all through Exeter to be very
much altered from the Miss Stanbury of old;--or even from the Miss
Stanbury of two years since. The Miss Stanbury of old was a stalwart
lady who would play her rubber of whist five nights a week, and could
hold her own in conversation against the best woman in Exeter,--not
to speak of her acknowledged superiority over every man in that city.
Now she cared little