wonderfully good thing. If the little fellow would only be happy
separated from his father; that was the question!

"Are there children in the house?" she asked. Mirko was peculiar, and
did not like other little boys.

"The doctor has an only little girl of about your brother's age. He is
nine and a half, is it not so? And she is delicate, too, so they could
play together."

This sounded more promising.

"I would wish to go down and see the doctor first--and the home," she
said.

"You shall do so, of course, when you like. I will set aside a certain
sum every year, to be invested for him, so that when he grows up he will
have a competence--even a small fortune. I will have a deed drawn out
for you to sign; it shall be all _en règle_."

"That is well," she said. "And now give me some money, please, that I
may relieve their present necessities until my brother can go to this
place. I do not consent to give myself, unless I am certain that I free
those I love from anxieties. I should like, immediately, a thousand
francs. Forty pounds of your money, isn't it?"

"I will send the notes up in a few minutes," Francis Markrute said. He
was in the best of tempers to-day. "Meanwhile, that part of the
arrangement being settled, I must ask you to pay some attention to the
thought of seeing your fiancé."