got
into it, "and now you must get out of it in your own way."

When Edward, having been assisted into the room, saw Ida standing
there, all the blood in his wasted body seemed to rush into his pallid
face.

"How do you do, Mr. Cossey?" she said. "I am glad to see you out, and
hope that you are better."

"I beg your pardon, I cannot hear you," he said, turning round; "I am
stone deaf in my right ear."

A pang of pity shot through her heart. Edward Cossey, feeble,
dejected, and limping from the jaws of Death, was a very different
being to Edward Cossey in the full glow of his youth, health, and
strength. Indeed, so much did his condition appeal to her sympathies
that for the first time since her mental attitude towards him had been
one of entire indifference, she looked on him without repugnance.

Meanwhile her father had shaken him by the hand, and led him to an
armchair before the fire.

Then after a few questions and answers as to his accident and merciful
recovery there came a pause.

At length he broke it. "I have come to see you both," he said with a
faint nervous smile, "about the letters you wrote me. If my condition
had allowed I should have come before, but it would not."

"Yes," said the Squire attentively, while Ida folded her hands in her
lap and sat still with her eyes fixed upon the fire.

"It seems," he went on, "that the old proverb has applied to my case
as to so many others--being absent I have suffered. I understand from
these letters that my engagement to you, Miss de la Molle, is broken
off."

She made a motion of assent.

"And that it is broken off on the ground that having been forced by a
combination of circumstances which I cannot enter into to transfer the
mortgages to Mr. Quest, consequently I broke my bargain with you?"

"Yes," said Ida.

"Very well then, I come to tell you both that I am ready to find the
money to meet those mortgages and to pay them off in full."

"Ah!" said the Squire.

"Also that I am ready to do what I offered to do before, and which, as
my father is now dead, I am perfectly in a position to do, namely, to
settle two hundred thousand pounds absolutely upon Ida, and indeed
generally to do anything else that she or you may wish," and he looked
at the Squire.

"It is no use looking to me for an answer," said he with some
irritation. "I have no voice in the matter."

He turned to Ida, who put her hand before her face and shook her head.

"Perhaps,"