ased her--but she was not
minded to tell me why she was pleased.

Half chaffing her, half really wondering what she would be at, I asked,
"Do you want Oxley Lodge for Margaret?"

"For her?" exclaimed Jenny, smiling still. "Why? Isn't this house big
enough for the mite?"

"Suppose you both marry--or either? You're both eminently marriageable
young women."

"Are we? Eminently marriageable? Well, I suppose so." She laughed. "Even
if one doesn't marry, it's something to be marriageable, isn't it?"

"A most valuable asset," said I. "Then you'd want two houses."

"I suppose we should. But how far you look ahead, Austin!"

"If that isn't Satan reproving sin--!" I cried.

"What do you suspect me of now?" she asked, still mocking, but genuinely
curious, I think, to fathom my thoughts.

"No, no! You'll be off on another tack if you think you've been
sighted."

She laughed as she rose from the table. "Oh, come out and walk! At any
rate, my getting Oxley would annoy Lady Sarah, wouldn't it?"

"You can annoy her cheaper than that!"

"There's plenty of money, Mr. Cartmell says," she answered, smiling over
her shoulder as she led the way.

I had a talk with Margaret, too, a little later on. Jenny sent us for a
moonlight stroll together. Young as the child was, she was good company,
independently of her place in Jenny's mind, which for me gave her an
adventitious interest. But what a contrast to Jenny, no less than to
Octon--and perhaps a more profound one! The fine new surroundings, the
enlarged horizon which Jenny's friendship opened to her, were still a
delightful bewilderment; she enjoyed actively, but she accepted
passively; she applauded the entertainment, but never thought of
arranging the bill of the play. Jenny could not have been like
that--even at seventeen; she would have itched to write some lines in
the book, to have a word to say to the scenes. Margaret's simplicity of
grateful responsiveness was untouched by any calculation.

"It's all just so wonderful!" she said to me, her arms waving over the
park, her brown eyes wide with surprised admiration.

She came to it only on an invitation. Jenny had come as owner. But Jenny
had not been overwhelmed like this. Jenny had kept cool, had taken it
all in--and been interested to survey, from Tor Hill, the next estate!

"To happen to me--suddenly! Ah, but I wish father had lived. If he could
have lived to marry Jenny! They were engaged when he--was killed, you