“My sister-in-law would have helped you in a hundred ways,” said Mr. Brander, regretfully. “She is a very energetic woman, and loves to have some active work to do for anybody, if there is a little occasion to show fight over it. And there is in your case; for that unmannerly old ruffian, John Oldshaw, who made himself so offensive just now at the inn, wanted to have the farm your father has taken, and will annoy you all in every way he can for spite, if I’m not mistaken.”
“If he does, I shall get papa to complain to Lord Stannington,” said Miss Denison, with a resolute expression about her mouth.
“Well, we must hope there won’t be any need to do so. Perhaps your father is a better farmer than John Oldshaw, and will be able to make him sing small.”
“Oh, I’m afraid not,” said she, shaking her head dolefully; “papa has never been a farmer before. He’s been a banker, but he never did much banking, I think; and the other partners bought him out of the bank a little while ago, and he did nothing at all for a little while. But we are not rich enough to live like that, so he thought he should like to try farming, especially as my step-mother had been ordered to live in the country.”
Mr. Brander looked grave. He could not help thinking that things looked very black for his pretty visitor. A weak and idle father, an invalid step-mother, such were the fancy portraits he instantly drew of the pair, setting up as amateurs in a business which even experience, industry, and capacity can scarcely nowadays make remunerative! What would become of the bright girl in these circumstances?
“How came they to send you down here all by yourself?” he asked, after a pause.
“My step-mother—you know I told you I had a step-mother,” she interpolated, with mischievous meaning—“has delicate health; that is to say, her health is too delicate for her ever to do anything she doesn’t wish to do, and she did not wish to come down to an empty house, to have all the worry and trouble of filling it. So I offered to do it. Home has been rather tiresome lately, and I thought it would be fun, and besides that I really wanted to be useful, and to make things as comfortable as I could for poor papa. But I did think she would see that the furniture was sent in time.”
“Yes, that’s an awkward business, certainly. We must consider what is best to be done. And while I’m thinking it over, you’ll have a glass of wine and a biscuit, won’t you?” said he, as he touched the bell.
Olivia did not refuse. She thought her best chance of a happy issue out of her difficulties lay in trusting to the clergyman, whose persistent kindness was fast effacing the unpleasant impression of a few minutes before. She even asked him ingenuously whether he thought she ought to stay any longer away from the bare house where she had left poor little Lucy alone with the mice. Mr. Brander quieted her conscience as, in obedience to his order, the maid servant brought in wine and cake, with which he proceeded to serve the hungry girl.
“I shall let you go in two minutes now,” he said. “And we won’t let Lucy starve either.”