Page:In the Roar of the Sea.djvu/178

170 Miss Trevisa shook her head.

"Then let me go to him!"

"Hoity-toity! here's airs and nonsense. Really, Judith, you are almost imbecile enough to qualify for the asylum. But I cannot afford the cost of you both. Jamie's cost in that establishment will be £70 in the year, and how much do you suppose that you possess?"

Judith remained kneeling upright, with her hands clasped, looking earnestly through her tears at her aunt.

"You have in all, between you, but £45 or £50. When the dilapidations are paid, and the expenses of the funeral, and the will-proving, and all that, I do not suppose you will be found to have a thousand pounds between you, and that put out to interest will not bring you more than I have said; so I shall have to make up the deficiency. That is not pleasing to me, you may well suppose. But I had rather pay £25 out of my poor income, than have the name of the family disgraced by Jamie."

"Jamie will never, never disgrace the name. He is too good. And—it is wicked, it is cruel to put him where you have. He is not an idiot."

"I am perhaps a better judge than you; so also is Mr. Obadiah Scantlebray, who has devoted his life to the care and study of the imbecile. Your brother has weak intellects."

"He is not clever, that is all. With application——"

"He cannot apply his mind. He has no mind that can be got to be applied."

"Aunt, he's no idiot. He must not be kept in that place."

"You had best go back to Polzeath. I have decided on what I considered right. I have done my duty."

"It cannot be just. I will see what Mr. Menaida says. He must be released; if you will not let him out, I will."

Miss Trevisa looked up at her quickly between her half-closed lids; a bitter, cruel smile quivered about her lips. "If any one can deliver him, it will be you."

Judith did not understand her meaning, and Aunt Dionysia did not care at that time to further enlighten her thereon. Finding her aunt inflexible, the unhappy girl left Pentyre Glaze and hurried back to Polzeath,