"Then you would stay, dear auntie?"
"No, dearest, I could not," she replied with deepening color. "When my sister wrote to your grandma and to me that she was dying, and we must take her place to her orphaned boy; when your grandfather, old Lord Hurston, placed you in my arms, then Hurston Hall became our home; but when Colonel Charles Thornbury is its master, it ceases to be so."
"How old is my uncle, Aunt Caddy?"
"Thirty-one, I think, Arthur."
"Thirty-one," was the thoughtful reply. "And he will be Lord Hurston when I die. I wish I knew him, Aunt Caddy. Do you think he would come to England if you wrote him? You knew him, auntie. I want to see him; I want to ask him not to leave Hurston to ruin and desolation; I want to ask him to let you stay and take care of the dear old place that grandpa was so proud of. I want to ask him not to let Johnson cut down the oaks that he wanted to thin out last fall. Dear, dear Aunt Caddy, won't you write for me?" pleaded the earnest little speaker.
"My darling Arthur," she replied with a deepening blush that freshened her pale face wonderfully, "I cannot. It—it—would be impossible."
"But why, Aunt Caddy?" continued the persevering boy. "Is he so very bad, so wicked, that you never speak? Is my uncle a bad man, Aunt Caddy? Has he"—and the boy's cheek flushed with the pride of his noble race—"has he disgraced us in any way?"
"My dear Arthur," was the hurried response, "oh! no; a thousand times no! Your uncle was proud, passionate, headstrong; but he was—he is, I am sure, all that is noble, brave, generous; and, Arthur, he loved your father as fondly as brothers could love."
"But why did he go away? Why do we not hear from him?"
"My darling," the words came reluctantly, "your grandpapa—in short, they had some disagreement when your uncle came of age about—about a marriage that the old lord had set his heart upon. But your uncle was unwilling; that is—the lady was rich, and he feared he would be thought mercenary—and—and—we must speak reverently of the dead, dear Arthur," and she bent to kiss his pale, pure brow; "but your uncle was not to blame. Let us talk no more about it now. See, the moon is rising. Look how large and beautiful it is! Have you no sonnet for such a scene, my gentle troubadour?"