"Not a bit of it," answered Arthur; "it suits me to stay at Brading's, and there I shall stop whether the dragon likes it or not, and you may tell her so if you like."
And Arthur walked away whistling. But when he reached the corner of the street, he dug his hands deep into his pockets, and forgot his whistle as he pondered over Adrian's words, wondering what they could mean, and whether there was any truth in the assertion that Lady Mary had him and his in her power, and could drive them out of Fairmead if he did not go willingly.
"Oh, dear! Those dreadful debts of the Pater's! It is enough to make a fellow say he would rather live on dry bread than go in debt for butter. I am sure Papa would never have brought all the trouble upon us if he had thought about it. Now I wonder what Aunt Mary could do, or whether the dragon is trying to bluff me as she has bluffed old Ted! How she hates his names of Ted and Tom! I do think she has been worse than ever over it the last year or two."
Arthur fell into a brown study over the question, and by the time he had reached home had worked himself into as great a state of perplexity as troubled Brading, although Arthur knew nothing of this beyond what he had heard that evening.
[CHAPTER VIII]
WHAT COULD SHE DO?
ARTHUR was afraid lest his sisters should see that something was troubling him, and took care to greet Molly with a smile and a joke. But he soon found that his younger sister was too much interested in what she was doing to pay much attention to him.
"What is that thing?" he asked, after watching her snip, snip, snip with the scissors as if her life depended upon the completion of her task.
Molly held up her work before him. "This thing is an old dressing-gown of Mamma's that we are going to make into a new one, and save the ten pounds Mamma wanted to spend in buying another. At first Mamma and Annie both said it would never be worth the trouble of turning, but when I unpicked a little bit, and they saw that the French merino looked as good as new on the side next to the lining, where of course it has been kept quite clean, they began to think something might be done with it if I would do all the unpicking."
"Not very interesting work, is it?" asked Arthur.