Abbey, but the summer had brought him unusual good fortune. As a matter of fact, everything seemed to be prospering with him just now. He was getting nervous about it, wondering how long it would last. He was glad that he had been able to pay Jim a good price for the place; beyond that, when everything was cleared up and Lady Coomber's annuity provided for, there would not be much left.
Mrs. Strong'nth'arm would not come to live at The Abbey, though Eleanor was anxious that she should and tried to persuade her. Whether she thought Eleanor did not really want her or whether the reasons she gave him were genuine Anthony could not be sure.
"I should be wandering, without knowing it, into the kitchen," she explained; "or be jumping up suddenly to answer a bell. Or maybe," she added with a smile, "I'd be slipping out of the back door of an evening to the little gate behind the stables, and thinking I saw your father under the shadow of the elms, where he used to be always waiting for me. I'll be happier in the old square. There are no ghosts there—leastways, not for my eyes to see."
Besides, there was his aunt to be considered. He had thought that she might find a home with one
