Katherine did not give him any very warm reception when the exciting news was communicated to her; but then Katherine was the little prim one, and not effusive to any one. “She is always like that,” Stella had said--“a stick! but she’ll stand up for me, whatever happens, all the same.”
“I say,” cried Sir Charles alarmed--“think it’ll be a hard job, eh? with the old man, don’t you know?”
“You will please,” said Stella with determination, “speak more respectfully of papa. I don’t know if it’ll be a hard job or not--but you’re big enough for that, or anything, I hope.”
“Oh, I’m big enough,” he said; but there was a certain faltering in his tone.
He did not drive with the two girls on their return to the Cliff the morning after the ball, but walked in to Sliplin the five miles to pull himself together. He had no reason that he knew of to feel anxious. The girl--it was by this irreverent title that he thought of her, though he was so fond of her--liked him, and her father, it was reported, saw everything with Stella’s eyes. She was the one that he favoured in everything. No doubt it was she who would have the bulk of his fortune. Sir Charles magnanimously resolved that he would not see the other wronged--that she should always have her share, whatever happened. He remembered long afterwards the aspect of the somewhat muddy road, and the hawthorn hedges with the russet leaves hanging to them still, and here and there a bramble with the intense red of a leaf lighting up the less brilliant colour. Yes, she should always have her share! He had a half-conscious feeling that to form so admirable a resolution would do him good in the crisis that was about to come.
Mr. Tredgold stood at the door to meet his daughters when they came home, very glad to see them, and to know that everybody was acquainted with the length of Stella’s stay at Steephill, and the favour shown her by Lady Jane, and delighted to have them back also, and to feel that these two pretty creatures--and especially the prettiest of the two--were his own private property, though there were no girls like them, far or near. “Well,” he said, “so here you are back again--glad to be back again I’ll be bound, though you’ve been among all the grandees! Nothing like home, is there, Stella, after all?” (He said ’ome, alas! and Stella felt it as she had never done before.) “Well, you are very welcome to your old pa. Made a great sensation, did you, little ’un, diamonds and all? How did the diamonds go down, eh, Stella? You must give them to me to put in my safe, for they’re not safe, valuable things like that, with you.”