esn't want it. He says Daddy's got to leave it to me.
That's what's worrying the dear old thing. He thinks it wouldn't be
fair."

"Who to?"

Jerrold laughed. "Why, to _Eliot_. He's got it into his dear old head
that he _ought_ to have it. He can't see that Eliot knows his own
business best. It _would_ be most awfully in his way... It's pretty
beastly for me, too. I don't like taking it when I know Daddy wants
Eliot to have it. That's to say, he _doesn't_ want; he'd like me to have
it, because I'd take care of it. But that makes him all the more stuck
on Eliot, because he thinks it's the right thing. I don't like having it
in any case."

"Why ever not?"

"Well, I _can_ only have it if Daddy dies, and I'd rather die myself
first."

"That's how I feel about my farm."

"Beastly, isn't it? Still, I'm not worrying. Daddy's frightfully
healthy, thank Heaven. He'll live to be eighty at the very least. Why--I
should be fifty."

"_You're_ all right," said Anne. "But it's awful for me. Grandpapa might
die any day. He's seventy-five _now_. It'll be ages before you're
fifty."

"And I may never be it. India may polish me off long before that." He
laughed his happy laugh. The idea of his own death seemed to Jerrold
irresistibly funny.

"_India_?"

He laughed again at her dismay.

"Rather. I'm going in for the Indian Civil."

"Oh Jerrold--you'll be away years and years, nearly all the time, like
Daddy, and I shan't ever see you."

"I shan't start for ages. Not for five years. Lots of time to see each
other in."

"Lots of time for _not_ seeing each other ever again."

She sat staring mournfully, seeing before her the agony of separation.

"Nonsense," said Jerrold. "Why on earth shouldn't you come out to India
too? I say, that would be a lark, wouldn't it? You would come, wouldn't
you?"

"Like a shot," said Anne.

"Would you give up your farm to come?"

"I'd give up anything."

"_That's_ all right. Let's go and play tennis."

They played for two hours straight on end, laughing and shouting.
Adeline, intensely bored by Eliot and his absurd affairs, came down the
lawn to look at them. She loved their laughter. It was good to have Anne
there. Anne was so happy.

John Severn came to her.

"Did you ever see anything happier than that absurd boy?" she said. "Why
can't Eliot be jolly and contented, too, like Jerrold?"

"Don't you think the chief reason may be that he _isn't_ Jerrold?"

"Jerrold's adorable. H