"And yet I believe she is better off than any of us," he said, "because she is so good." Clara began to wish that she had called him Will from the beginning, because she liked him so much.

He was just the man to have for a cousin,--a true loving cousin, stalwart, self-confident, with a grain or two of tyranny in his composition as becomes a man in relation to his intimate female relatives; and one, moreover, with whom she could trust herself to be familiar without any danger of love-making! She saw his character clearly, and told herself that she understood it perfectly.

He was a jewel of a cousin, and she must begin to call him Will as speedily as possible.
At last they came round in their walk to the gate leading into Colonel Askerton's garden; and here in the garden, close to the gate, they found Mrs.Askerton.I fancy that she had been watching for them, or at any rate watching for Clara, so that she might know how her friend was carrying herself with her cousin.

She came at once to the wicket, and there she was introduced by Clara to Mr.Belton.

Mr.
Belton as he made his bow muttered something awkwardly, and seemed to lose his self-possession for the moment.