level, while she listened in a strange inert way, feeling it hard to
fix her attention, yet half-amused by the simplicity of his
elucidations. "Would Ellen need to be told what an executor meant?"
thought she.

She was left sole guardian of the children, "the greatest proof of
confidence a parent can give," impressively observed the Colonel,
wondering at the languor of her acquiescence, and not detecting the
thought, "Dear Joe! of course! as if he would have done anything
else!"

"Of course," continued the Colonel, "he never expected that it would
have proved more than a nominal matter, a mere precaution. For my
own part, I can only say that I shall be always ready to assist you
with advice or authority if ever you should find the charge too
onerous for you."

"Thank you," was all she could bring herself to say at that moment,
feeling that her boys were her own, though the next she was
recollecting that this was no doubt the reason Joe had bidden her
live at Kenminster, and in a pang of self-reproach, was hardly
attending to the technicalities of the matters of property which were
being explained to her.

Her husband had not been able to save much, but his life insurance
was for a considerable sum, and there was also the amount inherited
from his parents. A portion of the means which his mother had
enjoyed passed to the elder brother, and Mrs. Brownlow had sunk most
of her individual property in the purchase of the house in which they
lived. By the terms of Joseph's will, everything was left to