‘Abstruse calculations?’ said he.
‘Yes, very,’ said she, sighing, with the mystified face of a child losing its way in a long sum.
He did not like to leave her in such evident difficulties, and said, with a smile, ‘Your budget? Are you good at arithmetic?’
‘I can do the sums, if that was all, but I don’t know what to set out from, or anything about it. Mamma said she could not think how I should keep house.’
‘She would be the best person to give you counsel, I should think.’
‘Yes, but—’ and she looked down, struggling with tears, ‘I must not write to ask her.’
‘How so!’
‘Arthur says the Wrangerton people would gossip, and I should not like that,’ said she; ‘only it is very hard to make out for myself, and those things tease Arthur.’
‘They are not much in his line,’ said John; ‘I don’t know,’ he added, hesitating, ‘whether it would be of any use to you to talk it over with me. There was a time when I considered the management of such an income; and though it never came to practice, mine may be better than no notions at all.’
‘Oh, thank you!’ said Violet, eagerly; then, pausing, she said, with a sweet embarrassment, ‘only—you can’t like it.’