SQUIRE ARDEN.

BY
MRS. OLIPHANT,
AUTHOR OF
“CHRONICLES OF CARLINGFORD,”
“SALEM CHAPEL,” “THE MINISTER’S WIFE,”
ETC., ETC.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
LONDON:
HURST & BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS,
13 GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.
1871.
The Right of Translation is Reserved.
PERTH:
Samuel Cowan & Co., Printers.

[Chapter I., ] [II., ] [III., ] [IV., ] [V., ] [VI., ] [VII., ] [VIII., ] [IX., ] [X., ] [XI., ] [XII., ] [XIII., ] [XIV., ] [XV., ] [XVI., ] [XVII., ] [XVIII., ] [XIX., ] [XX., ] [XXI., ] [XXII., ] [XXIII., ] [XXIV., ] [XXV., ] [XXVI., ] [XXVII., ] [XXVIII.]

SQUIRE ARDEN.

CHAPTER I.

Up to this time it had been Clare who had made herself anxious about her brother, worrying herself over his ways and his words, and all the ceaseless turns of thought and expression and perplexing spontaneousness which made him so unlike the Ardens; and Edgar had been conscious of her anxiety with a sense of amusement rather than of any other feeling. But now that their positions were reversed, and that it was he who was anxious about Clare, the matter was a great deal more serious. Edgar Arden felt but lightly the slights or the censures of fortune; he was not specially concerned about himself, nor prone to consider, unless on the strongest provocation, what people thought of him, or if he was taking the best way to obtain their suffrage. But this easy mind, which Clare sometimes took as a sign of levity of disposition, forsook him completely when his own duties were in question. He took them not lightly, but seriously, as Mr. Fazakerley, and Perfitt the steward, and everybody connected with the estate already knew. And not even the estate was so important as Clare. He asked himself, with a puzzled sense of ignorance and incapacity, what in such circumstances a brother ought to do. He had all the theories of a young man against any restraint or contradiction of the affections; but held them much more strongly than most young men, who it must be admitted are apt to see very clearly the necessity of interference in the love affairs of their sisters, however much they may dislike it in their own. Edgar had no family training to help him, and he was aware that English habits in such matters were different from those foreign habits which were the only ones with which he had any acquaintance, and which transferred all power in the matter into the hands of parents. Poor Clare! who had no mother to sympathise with her, no father to guide her—was it not his business to be doubly careful of all her wishes, to watch over her with double anxiety, and anticipate everything she would have him to do? But then, supposing she should wish to marry this landless and not very virtuous cousin, this man whose prospects were naught, whose character was so unsatisfactory, and with whom he himself had so little sympathy—would it be right to let her do it? Should he acquiesce simply without a word? Should he remonstrate? Should he speak of it to her? Or should he wait until she had first consulted him? Edgar found it very hard to answer these questions. He took to watching his sister, and her manner to Arthur Arden, her ways and her looks, and every passing indication; and got hopelessly bewildered, as was natural, in that maze of fluctuating evidence, which sometimes seemed to him to go dead against, and sometimes to be entirely in favour of his cousin.