"But you have never asked after them?"

"I took it for granted that they were as happy as could be expected.
Pray assure me that they are."

"I trust so now; but they have had trouble, and have left Graveleigh."

"Trouble! left Graveleigh! You make me uneasy. Pray explain."

"They had not been three months married and installed in the home they
owed to you, when poor Will was seized with a rheumatic fever. He was
confined to his bed for many weeks; and, when at last he could move
from it, was so weak as to be still unable to do any work. During his
illness Jessie had no heart and little leisure to attend to the shop.
Of course I--that is, my dear father--gave them all necessary
assistance; but--"

"I understand; they were reduced to objects of charity. Brute that I
am, never to have thought of the duties I owed to the couple I had
brought together. But pray go on."

"You are aware that just before you left us my father received a
proposal to exchange his property at Graveleigh for some lands more
desirable to him?"

"I remember. He closed with that offer."

"Yes; Captain Stavers, the new landlord of Graveleigh, seems to be a
very bad man; and though he could not turn the Somerses out of the