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“I can understand why you don't care about living at home,” she said. “Oh I wonder if I could do anything to mend it! I am so glad you have got something, Reginald. If you have a good servant, you might be quite comfortable by yourself, and we could come and see you. I should not feel it a bit—not a single bit; and it would be so much nicer for you.”

“You are mistaken,” said her brother. “It is not staying at home I object to. We are not very tidy or very comfortable, perhaps, but we all belong to each other, at least. It is not that, Ursula.”

“What is it, then? Janey says,” said Ursula, drawing a long breath of awe and admiration, “that you are to have two hundred and fifty pounds a year.”

“For doing nothing,” he said.

“For doing nothing?” She looked up at him a little bewildered, for his tone struck Ursula as not at all corresponding with the delightful character of the words he said. “But, Reginald, how nice, how very nice it sounds! How lucky you must have been! How could it happen that such a delightful thing should come to one of us? We are always so unlucky, papa says.”