"I am so glad!"
If Grey occupied the room, then it was Grey who snored, and not Bessie, who again went into the scales with the ten thousand a year, and who looked up surprised, and a little displeased at this salute before a stranger.
Grey had wondered when he ought to present his Christmas gift, and glanced around the room to see if Neil's was visible; but it was not, and he concluded to wait the progress of events.
Breakfast was late that morning, for Dorothy's rheumatic feet and ankles were worse than usual, and locomotion was difficult and painful; but with Bessie's assistance it was ready at last, and the family were just seating themselves at the table when there was the sound of a vehicle outside, with voices, and a great stamping of feet, as some one entered at the side piazza and came toward the dining-room.
"Mother; it must be mother," Bessie cried, but Neil had recognized a voice he knew, and said, a little curtly: "It is not your mother; it is Jack Trevellian," and in a moment Jack stood in the room, brushing the snow from his coat, and wishing them a merry Christmas as he shook hands with each in turn.
"Hallo, Jerrold, and Mack, you both here? This is a surprise!" he said, as he saw the two young men, and something in his tone made the watchful Neil suspect that it was not altogether a pleasant surprise.
Nor was it. Jack Trevellian had never been able to forget the soft blue eyes which had shone upon him in London, or the sweet month, with its sorry expression, which asked him not to play with the mother when he met her. No matter where he was, those eyes had haunted him, and the low earnest voice had rung in his ears until at last he had made up his mind that he would see her once more, and then he would go from her forever, for it would be madness to ask her to share his small income.
The puny Dick of Trevellian Castle was dead, and Hal was master there. Only one life now between Jack and wealth and Bessie; but as once before he called himself a murderer, so he had done again when he heard of Dick's death, and pulling the wild thought from him he wrote to Hal just as he had written to Dick, and told him he supposed he would be marrying now and settling down in the old home, and then there came over him so intense a longing for Bessie that he resolved upon the visit, feeling glad for the storm and the cold which would keep him in the house where he could have her all to himself. How then was he surprised to find both Neil and Grey Jerrold, the latter of whom he had met many times and between whom and himself there was a strong liking. But Jack was one who could easily cover up his feelings, and he greeted the young men warmly, and held Bessie's hand in his while he explained rapidly, as if anxious to get it off his mind, that he had gone to the "George" intending to take a room there as he had done before, but had found it quite shut up, and so he added, laughingly: "I have come here bag and baggage, and if I spend the night, as I should like to, I shall have to ask for a bed, or cot, or crib, or cradle; anything will do."