ill be very dreadful," she
said, "but it will soon be over. It is not what he will say at the
moment that I fear so much, as the bitter reproaches of his face when
I shall meet him afterwards." So, on the following morning, she again
made her way, and now without invitation, to the squire's study.

"Mr Dale," she began, starting upon her work with some confusion in
her manner, and hurry in her speech, "I have been thinking over what
we were saying together yesterday, and I have come to a resolution
which I know I ought to make known to you without a moment's delay."

The squire also had thought of what had passed between them, and had
suffered much as he had done so; but he had thought of it without
acerbity or anger. His thoughts were ever gentler than his words, and
his heart softer than any exponent of his heart that he was able to
put forth. He wished to love his brother's children, and to be loved
by them; but even failing that, he wished to do good to them. It had
not occurred to him to be angry with Mrs Dale after that interview
was over. The conversation had not gone pleasantly with him; but
then he hardly expected that things would go pleasantly. No idea had
occurred to him that evil could come upon any of the Dale ladies from
the words which had then been spoken. He regarded the Small House as
their abode and home as surely as the Great House was his own. In
giving him his due, it must be declared that any allusion to their
holding these as a benefit done to them by him had been very far from
his thoughts. Mrs Hearn, who held her cottage at half its real value,
grumbled almost daily at him as her landlord; but it never occurred
to him that therefore he should raise her rent, or that in not doing
so he was acting with special munificence. It had ever been to him
a grumbling, cross-grained, unpleasant world; and he did not expect
from Mrs Hearn, or from his sister-in-law, anything better than that
to which he had ever been used.

"It will make me very happy," said he, "if it has any bearing on
Bell's marriage with her cousin."

"Mr Dale, that is out of the question. I would not vex you by saying
so if I were not certain of it; but I know my child so well!"

"Then we must leave it to time, Mary."

"Yes, of course; but no time will suffice to make Bell change her
mind. We will, however, leave the subject. And now, Mr Dale, I have
to tell you of something else;--we have resolved to leave the Small
House."