direction of the house.

"Oh, Nelly," said Jack, rushing towards his sister, "she loves me--she
has said so--she is all my own."

"Of course she is, Jack. I never doubted it, though I own I scarcely
thought she'd have told it."

And the brother and sister walked along hand in hand without speaking,
a closer pressure of the fingers at intervals alone revealing how they
followed the same thoughts and lived in the same joys.

CHAPTER LXII. DEALING WITH CUTBILL

"What's to be done with Cutbill?--will any one tell me this?" was the
anxious question Augustus asked as he stood in a group composed of Jack,
Nelly, and the L'Estranges. "As to Sedley meeting him at all, I know
that is out of the question; but the mere fact of finding the man here
will so discredit us in Sedley's eyes that it is more than likely he
will pitch up the whole case and say good-bye to us forever."

"But can he do that?" asked Julia. "Can he, I mean, permit a matter of
temper or personal feeling to interfere in a dry affair of duty?"

"Of course he can; where his counsels are disregarded and even
counteracted he need not continue his guidance. He is a hot-tempered
man besides, and has more than once shown me that he will not bear
provocation beyond certain limits."

"I think," began L'Estrange, "if I were in _your_ place, I'd tell
Cutbill. I'd explain to him how matters stood; and--"

"No, no," broke in Jack; "that won't do at all. The poor dog is too
hard up for that."

"Jack is right," said Nelly, warmly.

"Of course he is, so far as Mr. Cutbill goes," broke in Julia; "but
we want to do right to every one. Now, how about your brother and his
suit?"

"What if I were to show him this letter," said Augustus, "to let him
see that Sedley means to be here to-morrow, to remain at farthest three
days; is it not likely Cutbill would himself desire to avoid meeting
him?"

"Not a bit of it," cried Jack. "It's the thing of all others he 'd glory
in; he 'd be full of all the lively impertinences that he could play off
on the lawyer; and he 'd write a comic song on him--ay, and sing it in
his own presence."

"Nothing more likely," said Julia, gravely.

"Then what is to be done? Is there no escape out of the difficulty?"
asked Augustus.

"Yes," said Nelly, "I think there is. The way I should advise would
be this: I 'd show Mr. Cutbill Sedley's letter, and taking him into
counsel, as it were, on the embarrassment of his own position, I 'd sa