Presently, however, a gleam of bright colour appeared at the hall door, and Maurice went forward and met her coming out.
"Shall I get you a shawl?" he said; "it is not very warm here."
"No, thank you; I like the cool air. I want to come out and talk to you, for grandpapa takes up all my attention when I am with him."
They began walking slowly up and down under the stone colonnade, which had been added as a decoration to the front of the dark red brick house, and Lady Dighton went on talking.
"I was so glad when I heard you were here. Ever since poor papa's death I have felt quite uncomfortable about grandpapa. I came over to see him as often as I could, but, of course, I had to think of Sir John."
"And Dighton is a good way from here?" Maurice said. He had not been quite sure whether his cousin would not regard him as an interloper, coming between her and her inheritance; and he was still sufficiently in the dark, to feel the subject an awkward one.
"Only six miles, fortunately. I say fortunately, _now_, because I hope we are going to be very good friends, but till I saw you, I was not sure whether it was fortunate. It is so disagreeable to have near neighbours whom one does not like, especially if they are relations."
Her frankness was amusing, but not very easy to answer. However, the two or three words he found for the occasion did perfectly well.
"You are exactly like the Beresfords," she went on, "and that I know must please grandpapa. He never liked me because I am like my mother's family. I don't mean that he is not fond of me in one way; I only mean that my being like the St. Clairs instead of like the Beresfords is one reason why he would never have left Hunsdon to me when there was anybody else to leave it to."
Maurice felt a little relieved and enlightened. His cousin then had never expected to inherit Hunsdon; he took courage on that, to ask a question.
"But as he could not have thought until lately of making a child of my mother's his heir, who was supposed to stand next in succession to my uncle?"
Lady Dighton gave a little sigh to the memory of her father.
"Grandpapa always wished him to marry again," she said. "Mamma died six years ago; then I was married, and from that time I know perfectly well that grandpapa was continually looking out for a new daughter-in-law. He was disappointed, however; I do not think myself that papa would have married. At any rate he did not; and then, nearly two years ago, he died."