sacrifice for her. He pressed her hand as he left her, and said
a word that was a word of comfort. "Clary, I cannot speak with
certainty, but I do not think that it will be sold."

"I am so glad!" she said. "Oh, Ralph, never, never part with it." And
then she blushed, as she thought of what she had said. Could it be
that he would think that she was speaking for her own sake;--because
she looked forward to reigning some day as mistress of Newton Priory?
Ah, no, Ralph would never misinterpret her thoughts in a manner so
unmanly as that!

The day came, and it was absolutely necessary that the answer should
be given. Neefit came to prompt him again, and seemed to sit on
the sofa with more feeling of being at home than he had displayed
before. He brought his cheque-book with him, and laid it rather
ostentatiously upon the table. He had good news, too, from Polly. "If
Mr. Newton would come down to Margate, she would be ever so glad."
That was the message as given by Mr. Neefit, but the reader will
probably doubt that it came exactly in those words from Polly's lips.
Ralph was angry, and shook his head in wrath. "Well, Captain, how's
it to be?" asked Mr. Neefit.

"I shall let my uncle know that I intend to keep my property," said
Ralph, with as much dignity as he knew how to assume.

The breeches-maker jumped up and crowed,--actually crowed, as might
have crowed a cock. It was an art that he had learned in his youth.
"That's my lad of wax," he said, slapping Ralph on the shoulder. "And
now tell us how much it's to be," said he, opening the cheque-book.
But Ralph declined to take money at the present moment, endeavouring
to awe the breeches-maker back into sobriety by his manner. Neefit
did put up his cheque-book, but was not awed back into perfect
sobriety. "Come to me, when you want it, and you shall have
it, Captain. Don't let that chap as 'as the 'orses be any way
disagreeable. You tell him he can have it all when he wants it. And
he can;--be blowed if he can't. We'll see it through, Captain. And
now, Captain, when'll you come out and see Polly?" Ralph would give
no definite answer to this,--on account of business, but was induced
at last to send his love to Miss Neefit. "That man will drive me into
a lunatic asylum at last," he said to himself, as he threw himself
into his arm-chair when Neefit had departed.

Nevertheless, he wrote his letter to his uncle's lawyer, Mr. Carey,
as follows:--

---- Club, 20 Sept.