“I am not saving anything odious. If we are to dispose of Highnoons advantageously, it must be put into some kind of order. I will engage to do what I can with the land, but I cannot undertake to set the house to rights. By doing that you will at once oblige me and give yourself an occupation that will divert your mind from all these troubles which you imagine to be gathering about your head.”
“To oblige you must of course be an object with me,” said Elinor in a trembling tone.
“Thank you. You are very good,” he responded with unimpaired calm.
A chuckle escaped Nicky. He grinned across the table at Elinor. “Oh, I beg pardon, but you know it is never the least use disputing with Ned, for he has always the best of it! He is the most complete hand! And I’ll tell you what! If you should find that there are rats at Highnoons I’ll come over with my dog, and we will have some famous sport!”
“Now, Nicky, do hold your tongue!” begged John. “But you know, ma’am, there is a great deal of sense in what Carlyon says. The place cannot be left without anyone to manage things, and I am sure I do not know who else is to go there.”
“But the servants!” she protested. “What must they think if I am suddenly foisted upon them?”
“So far as I am aware, only Barrow and his wife were lately employed by Eustace,” said Carlyon. “Which reminds me that you will do well to hire a couple of girls to work in the house. But you need entertain no qualms: Barrow has been at Highnoons for many years, and is necessarily conversant with all the circumstances that led up to the ceremony you took part in yesterday. He was greatly attached to my aunt, for which reason he has remained with my cousin. Neither he nor his wife is likely to cause you the smallest embarrassment. But I fear you will not find him an efficient butler. He was used to be a groom, and only came into the house when no other servant would remain there.”
“You know, Ned, I think Mrs. Cheviot should have some respectable female to bear her company there,” John interposed.
“Certainly she should, and I will discover one for her.”
“If I wanted a respectable female to live with me in that horrid house, I should beg my own old governess to come to me!” said Elinor.