"To think of the estate going to them that the master hated so! Sneaks and spies----"
"Not another word!" severely spoke Miss Winter. "You forget yourself, Aaron."
The old man bowed his head and let his arms fall by his side with a gesture of despair. Turning, he hobbled slowly from the room.
"Poor, faithful old soul!" cried Ella, as she gazed after him. "Wrongly though he has acted, it was done in loyalty to my uncle and me. And so, Edward," she added, bravely smiling through her tears, "you see that you will not have a well-dowered bride."
"So much the better, sweet one," answered Conroy, stealing his arm round her. "You will then owe something to me, instead of my owing so much to you. Nobody can now call me a fortune-hunter."
"They have not called you one."
"Have they not! Ask that old man, now gone out, what he thinks of me in his private thoughts. Ask your Aunt Gertrude; ask Mrs. Toynbee--ask the world."
"I am sure you have never been that."
"I don't think I have. But, Ella, it will be a sore parting--this of yours from Heron Dyke."
"I try not to think of it yet. When the day shall come I shall try to bear it as I best may."