If I behave so badly, I must keep away." But this threat so alarmed Anna that he took back his words.
"He is very unhappy--I think he gets more so," Anna thought, as she stood by her window that night; "and of course it is Elizabeth who makes him so." And that night Anna again wept and prayed for Malcolm--her dearest brother, as she called him--for deep down in her girlish heart there was buried the pure virginal love that she had unconsciously given him--a love that no touch or breath would ever wake into life now.
Malcolm was very repentant for days over his unkind speech, and on Christmas Eve, when he paid his next visit, he brought Anna a peace-offering in the shape of a valuable proof engraving of a picture she had long coveted.

Malcolm had had it beautifully framed.

Anna was enchanted with the gift, but Mrs.Herrick privately called her son to account for his extravagance.
"There was no need to make Anna such an expensive present," she said seriously.

"You must have paid twenty guineas for that engraving.

You are too lavish in your generosity.