"Teaching! in this overdone place!" she interrupted.
"It has been somewhat overdone in that way, certainly of late years," he answered. "If they cannot get teaching, they may find some other employment. Work of some sort."
"Work!" shrieked Mrs. Dare. "My daughters work!"
"Indeed, I don't know what else is to be done," he answered. "Their education has been good, and I should think they may obtain daily teaching: perhaps sufficient to enable you to live quietly. I will pay for a lodging for you, and give you a trifle towards housekeeping, until you can turn yourselves round."
"I wish we were all dead!" was the response of Mrs. Dare.
Mr. Ashley went a little nearer to her. "What is this story that your husband has been telling about the misappropriation of the money that Mr. Cooper desired should be handed to Edgar Halliburton?"
She threw her hands before her face with a low cry. "Has he been betraying that? What will become of us?—what shall we do with him? If ever a family was beaten down by fate, it is ours."
Not gratuitously by fate, thought Mr. Ashley. Its own misdoings have brought the evil upon it. "Where is Cyril?" he asked aloud. "He ought to bestir himself to help you, now."
"Cyril!" echoed Mrs. Dare, a bitter scowl rising to her face. "He help us! You know what Cyril is."
As they went out, they met Cyril. What a contrast the two cousins presented, side by side!—he and William might be called such. The one—fine, noble, intellectual; his countenance setting forth its own truth, candour, honour; making the best in his walk of life, of the talents entrusted to him by God. The other—slouching, untidy, all but ragged; his offensive doings too plainly shown in his bloated face, his inflamed eyes: letting his talents and his days run to worse than waste; a burden to himself and to those around him. And yet, in their boyhood days, how great had been Cyril's advantages over William Halliburton's!