It was about this time, the end of the first year, that a piece of good luck fell to Mr. St. George. He came into a fortune. Some relative in the West Indies died and left it to him. Timberdale put it down at a thousand pounds a-year, so I suppose it might be about five hundred. It was thought he might be for giving up his post at Mr. Delorane’s to be a gentleman at large. But he did nothing of the kind. He quitted his lodgings over Salmon’s shop, and went into a pretty house near Timberdale Court, with a groom and old Betty Huntsman as housekeeper, and set up a handsome gig and a grey horse. And that was all the change.
As the second year went on, Ellin Delorane began to droop a little. Aunt Hester did not like it. One of the kindest friends Ellin had was Alfred St. George. After the departure of young Brook, he had been so tender with Ellin, so considerate, so indulgent to her sorrow, and so regretful (like herself) of William’s absence, that he had won her regard. “It will be all right when he comes back, Ellin,” he would whisper: “only be patient.”
But in this, the second year, Mr. St. George’s tone changed. It may be that he saw no hope of any happy return, and deemed that, for her own sake, he ought to repress any hope left in her.
“There’s no more chance of his returning with a fortune than there is of my going up to the moon,” he said to Tod confidentially one day when we met him striding along near the Ravine.
“Don’t suppose there is—in this short time,” responded Tod.
“I’m afraid Ellin sees it, too: she seems to be losing her spirits. Ah, Brook should have done as I advised him—gone a little farther and dug in the gold-fields. He might have come back a Crœsus then. As it is—whew! I wouldn’t give a copper sixpence for his chance.”
“Do you know what I heard say, St. George?—that you’d like to go in for the little lady yourself.”
The white eye-balls surrounding St. George’s dark orbs took a tinge of yellow as they rolled on Tod. “Who said it?” he asked quietly.
“Darbyshire. He says you are in love with her as much as ever Brook was.”
St. George laughed. “Old Darbyshire? Well, perhaps he is not far wrong. Any way, love’s free, I believe. Were I her father, Brook should prove his eligibility to propose for her, or else give her up. Good-day, Todhetley; good-day, Johnny.”