ove-match."

"Yes;--and now she is at Nuncombe Putney, and he is roaming about in
London. He has to pay ever so much a year for his love-match, and she
is crushed into nothing by it. How long will she have to remain here,
Hugh?"

"How can I say? I suppose there is no reason against her remaining as
far as you are concerned?"

"For me personally, none. Were she much worse than I think she is, I
should not care in the least for myself, if I thought that we were
doing her good,--helping to bring her back. She can't hurt me. I am
so fixed, and dry, and established, that nothing anybody says will
affect me. But mamma doesn't like it."

"What is it she dislikes?"

"The idea that she is harbouring a married woman, of whom people say,
at least, that she has a lover."

"Is she to be turned out because people are slanderers?"

"Why should mamma suffer because this woman, who is a stranger to
her, has been imprudent? If she were your wife, Hugh--"

"God forbid!"

"If we were in any way bound to her, of course we would do our duty.
But if it makes mamma unhappy I am sure you will not press it. I
think Mrs. Merton has spoken to her. And then Aunt Stanbury has
written such letters!"

"Who cares for Aunt Jemima?"

"Everybody cares for her,--except you and I. And now this man who has
been here asking the servant questions has upset her greatly. Even
your coming has done so, knowing, as she does, that you have come,
not to see us, but to make inquiries about Mrs. Trevelyan. She is so
annoyed by it, that she does not sleep."

"Do you wish her to be taken away at once?" asked Hugh, almost in an
angry tone.

"Certainly not. That would be impossible. We have agreed to take her,
and must bear with it. And I would not have her moved from this, if I
thought that if she stayed awhile it might be arranged that she might
return from us direct to her husband."

"I shall try that, of course;--now."

"But if he will not have her;--if he be so obstinate, so foolish, and
so wicked, do not leave her here longer than you can help." Then Hugh
explained that Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley were to be in England in
the spring, and that it would be very desirable that the poor woman
should not be sent abroad to look for a home before that. "If it must
be so, it must," said Priscilla. "But eight months is a long time."

Hugh went out to smoke his pipe on the church-wall in a moody,
unhappy state of mind. He had hoped to have done so well