After Hugh had gone, the old lady sat back in her armchair and
read over again her letter from Mr. Grant; and, lest it should be
thought that that gentleman had only one side to his character, it
is as well for the reader to know what was in the letter. It ran
as follows:--
Dear Mrs. Gordon,
I am writing to you about a most important matter. Colonel Selwyn
is dead, and my daughter has come out from England. I don't know
anyone to take charge of her except yourself. I am an old man now,
and set in my ways, and this girl is really all I have to live
for. Looking back on my life, I see where I have been a fool; and
perhaps the good fortune that has followed me has been more luck
than anything else. Your husband was a smarter man than I am, and
he came to grief, though I will say that I always warned him against
that Western place.
Do you remember the old days when we had the two little homesteads,
and I used to ride down from the out-station of a Saturday and
spend Sunday with you and Andrew, and talk over the fortunes we
were going to make? If I had met a woman like you in those days I
might have been a better man. As it was, I made a fool of myself.
But that's all past praying for.
Now about my girl. If you will take her, and make her as good
a woman as yourself, or as near it as you can, you will earn my
undying thanks.
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