"Well, I have lashed about me at abuses, in my time," said Dr. May.

"I dare say you have, Dick!" and they both laughed--the inconsiderate way was so well delineated.

"Just so," replied Dr. May; "and I made enemies enough to fetter me now.

I do not mean that I have done right--I have not; but there is a good deal on my hands, and I don't write easily. I have been slower to take up new matters than I ought to have been."

"I see, I see!" said Dr. Spencer, rather sorry for his implied reproach, "but must Cocksmoor be left to its fate, and your gallant daughter to hers?"

"The vicar won't stir. He is indolent enough by nature, and worse with gout; and I do not see what good I could do. I once offended the tenant, Nicolson, by fining him for cheating his unhappy labourers, on the abominable truck system; and he had rather poison me than do anything to oblige me. And, as to the copyholder, he is a fine gentleman, who never comes near the place, nor does anything for it."

"Who is he?"

"Sir Henry Walkinghame."

"Sir Henry Walkinghame! I know the man. I found him in one of the caves at Thebes, among the mummies, laid up with a fever, nearly ready to be a mummy himself! I remember bleeding him--irregular, was not it? but one does not stand on ceremony in Pharaoh's tomb. I got him through with it; we came up the Nile together, and the last I saw of him was at Alexandria. He is your man! something might be done with him!"

"I believe Flora promises to ask him if she should ever meet him in London, but he is always away. If ever we should be happy enough to get an active incumbent, we shall have a chance."

Two days after, Ethel came down equipped for Cocksmoor. It was as hot as ever, and Mary was ordered to stay at home, being somewhat pacified by a promise that she should go again as soon as the weather was fit for anything but a salamander.

Dr. Spencer was in the hall, with his bamboo, his great Panama hat, and gray loose coat, for he entirely avoided, except on Sundays, the medical suit of black. He offered to relieve Ethel of her bag of books.

"No thank you." (He had them by this time). "But I am going to Cocksmoor."

"Will you allow me to be your companion?"

"I shall be very glad of the pleasure of your company, but I am not in the least afraid of going alone," said she, smiling, however, so as to show she was glad of such pleasant company. "I forewarn you though that I have business there."

"I will find occupation."

"And you must promise not to turn against me. I have undergone a great deal already about that place. Norman was always preaching against it, and now that he has become reasonable, I can't have papa set against it again--besides, he would mind you more."

Dr. Spencer promised to do nothing but what was quite reasonable. Ethel believed that he accompanied her merely because his gallantry would not suffer her to go unescorted, and she was not sorry, for it was too long a walk for solitude to be very agreeable, when strange wagoners might be on the road, though she had never let them be "lions in the path."

The walk was as pleasant as a scorching sun would allow, and by the time they arrived at the scattered cottages, Ethel had been drawn into explaining many of her Cocksmoor perplexities.

"If you could get the land granted, where should you choose to have it?"

he asked. "You know it will not do to go and say, 'Be pleased to give me a piece of land,' without specifying what, or you might chance to have one at the Land's End."

"I see, that was one of the blunders," said Ethel. "But I had often thought of this nice little square place, between two gardens, and sheltered by the old quarry."

"Ha! hardly space enough, I should say," replied Dr. Spencer, stepping it out. "No, that won't do, so confined by the quarry. Let us look farther."

A surmise crossed Ethel. Could he be going to take the work on himself, but that was too wild a supposition--she knew he had nothing of his own, only a moderate pension from the East India Company.

"What do you think of this?" he said, coming to the slope of a knoll, commanding a pretty view of the Abbotstoke woods, clear from houses, and yet not remote from the hamlet. She agreed that it would do well, and he kicked up a bit of turf, and pryed into the soil, pronouncing it dry, and fit for a good foundation. Then he began to step it out, making a circuit that amazed her, but he said, "It is of no use to do it at twice. Your school can be only the first step towards a church, and you had better have room--enough at once. It will serve as an endowment in the meantime."

He would not let her remain in the sun, and she went into school.

She found him, when she came out, sitting in the arbour smoking a cigar-rather a shock to her feelings, though he threw it away the instant she appeared, and she excused him for his foreign habits.

In the evening, he brought down a traveller's case of instruments, and proceeded to draw a beautiful little map of Cocksmoor, where it seemed that he had taken all his measurements, whilst she was in school. He ended by an imaginary plan and elevation for the school, with a pretty oriel window and bell-gable, that made Ethel sigh with delight at the bare idea.

Next day, he vanished after dinner, but this he often did; he used to say he must go and have a holiday of smoking--he could not bear too much civilised society. He came back for tea, however, and had not sat down long before he said, "Now, I know all about it. I shall pack up my goods, and be off for Vienna to-morrow."

"To Vienna!" was the general and dolorous outcry, and Gertrude laid hold of him and said he should not go.

"I am coming back," he said, "if you will have me. The college holds a court at Fordholm on the 3rd, and on the last of this month, I hope to return."

"College! Court! What are you going to do at Vienna? Where have you left your senses?" asked Dr. May.

"I find Sir Henry Walkinghame is there. I have been on an exploring expedition to Drydale, found out his man of business, and where he is to be written to. The college holds a court at Fordholm, and I hope to have our business settled."

Ethel was too much confounded to speak. Her father was exclaiming on the shortness of the time.

"Plenty of time," said Dr. Spencer, demonstrating that he should be able to travel comfortably, and have four days to spare at Vienna--a journey which he seemed to think less of, than did Dr. May of going to London.

As to checking him, of that there was no possibility, nor, indeed, notion, though Ethel did not quite know how to believe in it, nor that the plan could come to good. Ethel was much better by this time: by her vigorous efforts, she had recovered her tone of mind and interest in what was passing; and though now and then Norman's letters, carrying sentences of remembrance, made her glow a little, she was so steady to her resolution that she averted all traffic in messages through her brother's correspondence, and, in that fear, allowed it to lapse into Margaret's hands more than she had ever done. Indeed, no one greatly liked writing from home, it was heartless work to say always, "No news from the Alcestis" and yet they all declared they were not anxious.

Hector Ernescliffe knelt a great while beside Margaret's sofa, on the first evening of his holidays, and there was a long low-voiced talk between them. Ethel wished that she had warned him off, for Margaret looked much more harassed and anxious, after having heard the outpouring of all that was on his mind.

Dr. Spencer thought her looking worse, when he came, as come he did, on the appointed day. He had brought Sir Henry Walkinghame's full consent to the surrender of the land; drawn up in such form as could be acted upon, and a letter to his man of business. But Nicolson! He was a worse dragon nearer home, hating all schools, especially hating Dr. May.

However, said Dr. Spencer, in eastern form, "Have I encountered Rajahs, and smoked pipes with three-tailed Pachas, that I should dread the face of the father of quarrymen."

What he did with the father of quarrymen was not known, whether he talked him over, or bought him off--Margaret hoped the former; Dr. May feared the latter; the results were certain; Mr. Nicolson had agreed that the land should be given up.

The triumphant Dr. Spencer sat down to write a statement to be shown to the college authorities, when they should come to hold their court.

"The land must be put into the hands of trustees," he said. "The incumbent of course?"

"Then yourself; and we must have another. Your son-in-law?"

"You, I should think," said Dr. May.

"I! Why, I am going."

"Going, but not gone," said his friend.

"I must go! I tell you, Dick; I must have a place of my own to smoke my pipe in."

"Is that all?" said Dr. May. "I think you might be accommodated here, unless you wished to be near your sister."

"My sister is always resorting to watering-places. My nieces do nothing but play on the piano. No, I shall perhaps go off to America, the only place I have not seen yet, and I more than half engaged to go and help at Poonshedagore."

"Better order your coffin then," muttered Dr. May.

"I shall try lodgings in London, near the old hospital, perhaps--and go and turn over the British Museum library."