"I think," he continued, "that the next best thing to being happy one's self is to be able to make other people so. Perhaps that may be the sort of happiness they have in the next world. I often speculate about it, and wonder what sort of creature I shall find myself there. But." added he, abruptly, "now to business. You will be my secretary this morning instead of Bruce?"
"Willingly;" for, though she too, like Malcolm, had been a little displaced by this charming cousin, there was not an atom of jealousy in her nature. Hers was that pure and unselfish affection which could bear to stand by and see those she loved made happy, even though it was by another than herself.
She fell to work in her old way, and the earl employed as much as he required her ready handwriting, her clear head, and her full acquaintance with every body and every thing in the district; for Helen was a real minister's daughter—as popular and as necessary in the parish as the minister himself; and she was equally important at the Castle, where she was consulted, as this morning, on every thing Lord Cairnforth was about to do, and on the wisest way of expending—he did not wish to save—the large yearly income which he now seemed really beginning to enjoy.
Helen, too, after a long morning's work, drew her breath with a sigh of pleasure.
"What a grand thing it is to be as rich as you are!"
"Why so?"
"One can do such a deal of good with plenty of money."
"Yes. Should you like to be very rich, Helen?" watching her with an amused look.
Helen shook her head and laughed. "Oh, it's no use asking me the question, for I shall never have the chance of being rich."
"You can not say; you might marry, for instance."