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After dinner, when Mr Boyce had again gone forth upon his labours, the same subject was discussed between Mrs Boyce and her daughters, and the mother was very careful to teach her children that Mrs Dale would be just as good a person as ever she had been, and quite as much a lady, even though she should live in a very dingy house at Guestwick; from which lesson the Boyce girls learned plainly that Mrs Dale, with Bell and Lily, were about to have a fall in the world, and that they were to be treated accordingly.
When he had come near the Guestwick Mansion in his old walks, always, however, keeping at a great distance lest the grumpy old lord should be down upon him and scold him, he had little dreamed that he and the grumpy old lord would ever be together on such familiar terms, that he would tell to that lord more of his private thoughts than to any other living being; yet it had come to that.
The weather was cold. The presence of the malady in the house had caused them all to be careful, and, moreover, good advice was at hand at once. The doctor begged Mrs Dale not to be uneasy, but he was very eager in begging that the two sisters might not be allowed to be together. "Could you not send Bell into Guestwick, to Mrs Eames's?" said he.
"Ah," said she, "I think I'll go and look at lodgings at Guestwick myself, and pack up some of my beds." Lily made no answer to this, feeling that it was a part of that punishment which she had expected.
But Johnny Eames himself, as he rode back to Guestwick, forgetful of his spurs, and with his gloves stuffed into his pocket, thought of the matter very differently.
Yet when he met Bell at the Manor House he accosted her cheerily, telling her with much appearance of satisfaction that that flitting into Guestwick was not to be accomplished. "I am so glad," said she. "It is long since I wished it." "And I do not think your mother wishes it now." "I am sure she does not. It was all a misunderstanding from the first.
Under such circumstances Eames was too honest a man not to do it, let the difficulties in his way be what they might. He had sat there for an hour, and Mrs Dale still remained with her daughter. Should he get up boldly and ask Lily to put on her bonnet and come out into the garden? As the thought struck him, he rose and grasped at his hat. "I am going to walk back to Guestwick," said he.
"Yes," said Mary; "and they say that she has refused her cousin Bernard, and that, therefore, the squire is taking away the house from them. You know they're all coming into Guestwick." "Yes, I know they are. But I don't believe that the squire is taking away the house." "Why should they come then? Why should they give up such a charming place as that?" "Rent-free!" said Mrs Eames.
Mrs Dale held her brother-in-law in no awe, and sometimes gave to the widow from Guestwick advice quite at variance to that given by the squire. In this way there had grown up an intimacy between Bell and Lily and the young Eames, and either of the girls was prepared to declare that Johnny Eames was her own and well-loved friend.
So it was settled among them that notice should be given to their uncle of their intention to quit the Small House of Allington. And then came the question as to their new home. Mrs Dale was aware that her income was at any rate better than that possessed by Mrs Eames, and therefore she had fair ground for presuming that she could afford to keep a house at Guestwick.
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