They parted. But Jasper did not keep to the straight way home.
First of all, he loitered to watch a reaping-machine at work;
then he turned into a lane which led up the hill on which was
John Yule's house. Even if he had purposed making a farewell
call, it was still far too early; all he wanted to do was to pass
an hour of the morning, which threatened to lie heavy on his
hands. So he rambled on, and went past the house, and took the
field-path which would lead him circuitously home again.

His mother desired to speak to him. She was in the dining-room;
in the parlour Maud was practising music.

'I think I ought to tell you of something I did yesterday,
Jasper,' Mrs Milvain began. 'You see, my dear, we have been
rather straitened lately, and my health, you know, grows so
uncertain, and, all things considered, I have been feeling very
anxious about the girls. So I wrote to your uncle William, and
told him that I must positively have that money. I must think of
my own children before his.'

The matter referred to was this. The deceased Mr Milvain had a
brother who was a struggling shopkeeper in a Midland town. Some
ten years ago, William Milvain, on the point of bankruptcy, had
borrowed a hundred and seventy pounds from his brother in
Wattleborough, and this debt was still unpaid; for on the death
of Jasper's father repayment of the loan was impossible for
William, and since then it had seemed hopeless that the sum would
ever be recovered. The poor shopkeeper had a large family, and
Mrs Milvain, notwithstanding her own position, had never felt
able to press him; her relative, however, often spoke of the