I say,
of Cambridgeshire."

"Exactly;--and therefore I have told George that he shall have my
money whenever he wants it."

Kate was very persistent in her objection to this scheme till
George's answer came. His answer to Alice was accompanied by a letter
to his sister, and after that Kate said nothing more about the
money question. She said no more then; but it must not therefore be
supposed that she was less determined than she had been that no part
of Alice's fortune should be sacrificed to her brother's wants;--at
any rate before Alice should become her brother's wife. But her
brother's letter for the moment stopped her mouth. It would be
necessary that she should speak to him before she again spoke to
Alice.

In what words Alice had written her assent it will be necessary that
the reader should know, in order that something may be understood
of the struggle which she made upon the occasion; but they shall be
given presently, when I come to speak of George Vavasor's position as
he received them. George's reply was very short and apparently very
frank. He deprecated the delay of twelve months, and still hoped to
be able to induce her to be more lenient to him. He advised her to
write to Mr Grey at once,--and as regarded the Squire he gave her
_carte blanche_ to act as she pleased. If the Squire required any
kind of apology, expression of sorrow,--and asking for pardon, or
such like, he, George, would, under the circumstances as they now
existed, comply with the requisition most willingly. He would regard
it as a simple form, made necessary by his coming marriage. As to
Alice's money, he thanked her heartily for her confidence. If the
nature of his coming contest at Chelsea should make it necessary,
he would use her offer as frankly as it had been made. Such was his
letter to Alice. What was contained in his letter to Kate, Alice
never knew.

Then came the business of telling this new love tale,--the
third which poor Alice had been forced to tell her father and
grandfather;--and a grievous task it was. In this matter she feared
her father much more than her grandfather, and therefore she resolved
to tell her grandfather first;--or, rather, she determined that she
would tell the Squire, and that in the mean time Kate should talk to
her father.

"Grandpapa," she said to him the morning after she had received her
cousin's second letter.--The old man was in the habit of breakfasting
alone in a closet of his own,