broke in.

"My dear mother!" he ejaculated, in a compassionate and forbearing way.

"Ah, Bob knows it is not better," laughed Deb. "And it isn't, Mary; you
are no authority, my dear. Which of the public schools do you fancy,
Bob?"

He mentioned his choice, and the University scholarships that were to
be had there.

"Debbie!" implored Mrs Goldsworthy, under her breath.

"Hush-sh!" hissed her husband.

"You be quiet, Molly," Deb playfully adjured her. "This has nothing to
do with you, or with anybody except Bob and me. You come and spend your
next vacation with me at Redford, Bob, and then we can talk it all over
together."

She nodded to him meaningly. He smiled with perfect comprehension.

"How can we thank you," Mr Goldsworthy murmured emotionally, for he
also understood. "It is too, too--"

"It's all right, pater," the remarkable boy silenced him. "Aunt Deborah
knows how we feel about it."

Mary sat in stolid silence, for once indifferent to her husband's dumb
command; then tears welled into her tired eyes. She pocketed her pride
for her child's sake. It had been her hopeless longing for years to
give her darling's splendid abilities full scope.

"He will repay you, Debbie," she said.

"Ah, don't be so grudging--so ungenerous!" cried Deb.

Tea and cakes were brought in, and Bob, as he was thenceforth to be
styled, waited upon his aunt in the correctest manner. He had by this
time taken on an air that seemed to say: "You and I understand the
ropes; you must excuse these poor parents of mine, who were not born
with our perceptions." And Deb, no more proof against this sort of
thing than meaner mortals, had a feeling of special proprietorship in
him which she found pleasant, although he was not exactly the
heir-on-probation that she could have wished; which, of course, it
would have been preposterous to expect in a son of Bennet
Goldsworthy's. Bennet Goldsworthy accompanied her to the gate when she
went away, forbidding Mary to expose herself, hatless, to the wind. And
there the benevolent aunt's "intentions" were more distinctly
formulated.

"I wish to take entire charge of his education, if you will allow me.
He is a very promising boy, and should have all his chances. Let me
send him to the Melbourne Grammar after Christmas, and as a boarder, if
you don't mind. There are such advantages, both in position and for
study, in living at the school."

"I leave everything--everything, in your hands," mur