to comparing her with Miss Ferrars, he could not think of it for a
moment. So they settled at Bayford, and there, about two years ago,
came this terrible visitation of typhus fever.'

'I remember how Colonel Bury used to come and sigh over his friend's
illness and trouble.'

'He could not help going over it again. The children all fell ill
together--the two eldest were twin boys, one puny, the other a very
fine fellow, and his father's especial pride and delight. As so
often happens, the sickly one was spared, the healthy one was taken.'

'Then Albinia will have an invalid on her hands!'

'The Colonel says this Edmund was a particularly promising boy, and
poor Kendal felt the loss dreadfully. He sickened after that, and
his wife was worn out with nursing and grief, and sank under the
fever at once. Poor Kendal has never held up his head since; he had
a terrible relapse.'

'And,' said Winifred, 'he no sooner recovers than he goes and marries
our Albinia!'

'Two years, my dear.'

'Pray explain to me, Maurice, why, when people become widowed in any
unusually lamentable way, they always are the first to marry again.'

'Incorrigible. I meant to make you pity him.'