She replied cheerfully, and steadily—
"Thrue, for ye, sir; but there's good luck afore yez, for all that—an' Miss Kate an meself's goin' to be as bould as lions, so we are faith, I'll see yez give the go-bye to thim thavin' attornies, yet."
Swiftly sped the interval that remained before they left their peaceful dwelling; numerous were the arrangements to be made before the final move, and the selections of those peculiarly sacred treasures, that could not be left behind, the number of which was daily swelled. Winter took charge of the Colonel's picture, but, "John Anderson," was packed for removal—music and drawings—a pet vase or two—her books, and some cushions for the Colonel, was all that Kate could take with her of her pleasant, pretty home; but the sofa and prie dieu, at which she had so diligently worked, to give an air of greater elegance to their little drawing-room—the arm chair, so associated in her mind's eye with the noble, venerable form of her grandfather—the flower garden, now bursting into radiant beauty, and which Fred Egerton used so much to admire, even in its autumn garb—all these must pass away into strange hands; she must not only leave her ark, but ever think of it as desecrated! And, Elijah Bush, too, he must be left; and the navigator's little orphan; and the keeper's sickly boy—all her poor people—the various objects to which her full, rich sympathies so freely flowed.
Yes; many a link that bound her, closely and pleasantly, to her calm and quiet life, in their ecclesiastical retreat, she was compelled to break; and still through all the saddening occupations which preceded their dreaded journey, Kate endeavoured to keep her mind fixed upon the future she had laid down for herself, with a steadiness which, exhibited in some more high sounding and attractive cause than the mere common-place duty of earning bread for her parent, would have drawn forth odes and laudations from many a potent pen.
Nurse's conduct was beyond all praise; not even when alone with Kate, did she indulge in anything beyond a passing condemnation of attorneys, generally; and good little Mrs. Winter, only half enlightened as to the real motives of her friends' departure, was invulnerable to the prying of Miss Araminta Cox.
Matters stood thus and time had run by, to within a week of the removal to London, when Gilpin, now very weak, interrupted Kate's practice one morning.
"My dear Mr. Gilpin," said she, rising to receive him, with some surprise, "this is most imprudent!"
"I could not let you go without paying one more visit to the Priory." His cough interrupted him.
"But we should have called on you, I intended doing so with grandpapa; indeed you were wrong to venture out, but, as you are here, how glad I am to see you, and the day is so fine."