ld be more of a
help and comfort to him!" she said, raising her eyes to the lawyer's
face.

"It is a singular thing, Miss Fairfax, but your grandfather never seems
to want help or comfort like other men. He shuts himself up and
broods--just broods--when he is grieved or angry. He was very genial and
pleasant as a young man, but he had a disappointment of the affections
that quite soured him. I do not know that he ever made a friend of any
one but his sister Dorothy. They were on the Continent for a year after
that affair, and she died in Italy. He was a changed man when he came
home, and he married a woman of good family, but nobody was, perhaps,
more of a stranger to him than his own wife. It was generally remarked.
And he seemed to care as little for her children as he did for her. I
have often been surprised to see that he was indifferent whether they
came to Abbotsmead or not; yet the death of Mr. Geoffry, your father,
hurt him severely, and Mr. Frederick's will be no less a pain."

"I wish I had not vexed him about my uncle Laurence's boys. We were
becoming good friends before," said Bessie.

"Oh, the squire will not bear malice for that. He discriminates between
the generosity of your intention towards the children, and what he
probably mistook for a will to rule himself. He acted very perversely in
going out of the way."

"Does my uncle Laurence know the news you bring?"

"Yes, but he desired me to be the first medium of it. Jonquil is a long
while seeking his master."

A very long while. So long that Bessie rang the bell to inquire, and
the little page answered it. The master was not come in, he said; they
had sent every way to find him. Bessie rose in haste, and followed by
Mr. John Short went along the passage to her grandfather's private room.
That was dark and empty, and so was the lobby by which it communicated
with the garden and the way to the stables. She was just turning back
when she bethought her to open the outer door, and there, at the foot of
the steps on the gravel-walk, lay the squire. She did not scream nor
cry, but ran down and helped to carry him in, holding his white head
tenderly. For a minute they laid him on the couch in the justice-room,
and servants came running with lights.

"It is not death," said Mrs. Betts, peering close in the unconscious
face. "The fire is out here: we will move him to his chamber at once."

As they raised him again one stiffened hand that clutched a lette