More was not spoken, for the lips were pressed by a rapturous kiss, as he clasped her to his heart, muttering, “My own, my own!”
“I declare there is Nelly,” cried Julia, wresting herself from his embrace, and starting off; not, however, towards Ellen, but in the direction of the house.
“Oh, Nelly,” said Jack, rushing towards his sister, “she loves me—she has said so—she is all my own.”
“Of course she is, Jack. I never doubted it, though I own I scarcely thought she'd have told it.”
And the brother and sister walked along hand in hand without speaking, a closer pressure of the fingers at intervals alone revealing how they followed the same thoughts and lived in the same joys.
CHAPTER LXII. DEALING WITH CUTBILL
“What's to be done with Cutbill?—will any one tell me this?” was the anxious question Augustus asked as he stood in a group composed of Jack, Nelly, and the L'Estranges. “As to Sedley meeting him at all, I know that is out of the question; but the mere fact of finding the man here will so discredit us in Sedley's eyes that it is more than likely he will pitch up the whole case and say good-bye to us forever.”
“But can he do that?” asked Julia. “Can he, I mean, permit a matter of temper or personal feeling to interfere in a dry affair of duty?”
“Of course he can; where his counsels are disregarded and even counteracted he need not continue his guidance. He is a hot-tempered man besides, and has more than once shown me that he will not bear provocation beyond certain limits.”