spoiling the little girl," he would add as a postscript; or, "I hope the
child is learning something besides monkey-tricks." These insinuations
always annoyed Mrs. Rushton, and she never condescended to answer them.
The suggestion that she had incurred a great responsibility by adopting
Hetty was highly disagreeable to her.

It is hard to say how long this state of things might have gone on had
not Mrs. Rushton's health become delicate. She suddenly found herself
unable to enjoy the gay life which was so much to her natural taste. The
doctors recommended her a quiet sojourn in her native air, and warned
her that she ought to live near friends who felt a real interest in her.

Of what these hints might mean Mrs Rushton did not choose to think, but
physical weakness made her long for the rest of her own country home.




CHAPTER VI.

HETTY AND HER "COUSINS"


One cool fresh evening in October Mrs. Rushton, Hetty, Grant the maid,
and an old man-servant who followed his mistress everywhere, arrived at
the railway-station near Wavertree, and were driven along the old
familiar country road with the soft purpled woods on one side, and the
green plains and distant view of the sea on the other. They arrived at
Amber Hill just as lights began to spring up in the long narrow windows
of the comfortable old gray house, lights more near and bright than the