“Oh, Mr. Rector, if that is what you mean!” murmured Miss Hofland, abashed.
“Papa was the same once,” said Hetty, roused out of her self-occupation. “We had a delightful house and a great, beautiful garden. But then the old gentleman died, and we had to give it up.”
“When my old gentleman dies, I shall have to give it up too; but I hope he will outlive me. When an old man like that gets up among the eighties, he may just as well live for ever: and I’m sure I hope he will. So, you see, I have a long experience of being dependent; and I should like to give you the help of my experience, you who are at the other end. But I hope you will not have to live this kind of life.”
“You needn’t feel any dependence unless you please,” said Miss Hofland. “I would not set her against it, Mr. Rector, if she should have to follow it, for a girl in most cases cannot choose for herself.”
“I don’t mean to set her against it,” said the old clergyman; but they were both interrupted by Hetty, to whom this opening of a new interest was invaluable.
“If this old gentleman is so old,” she said, “I wonder what his name is? I wonder if perhaps he is the old Rector, Uncle Hugh, that mamma used to tell us about?”
The little group round Hetty was thunder-struck by this remark. Miss Hofland hastily took up the eau-de-cologne, with a glance of alarm; and the doctor lifted his head sharply and fixed his eyes upon her, as if with a sudden gleam of hope.
“Uncle Hugh!” cried the old clergyman. “My dear Miss Hester—I—this is very surprising. He is Mr. Hugh Prescott, certainly, if you happen to mean that.”
“Oh,” cried Hetty, with awakened interest, “then it is Uncle Hugh! Mamma has not heard of any of them for such a long time. She says it is so wrong not to keep up writing, but there are so many of us, and she has so much to do. Then Uncle Hugh is still alive! I will write directly and tell her. She will be so pleased to know.”
“Then your mother is——? To be sure!” cried the old clergyman. “Asquith! I ought to have remembered. It is not so common a name but that I might have remembered. Your father was once the curate here.” He looked round upon his companions with a strange look, as if admitting some new possibility from which unknown combinations might arise. “Why, she’s a relation of the family,” he said.