CHAPTER LXXX. 

SHOWING HOW AFFAIRS SETTLED THEMSELVES AT NONINGSBY. 

We must now go back to Noningsby for one concluding chapter, and then our work will be completed. "You are not to go away from Noningsby when the trial is over, you know. Mamma said that I had better tell you so." It was thus that Madeline had spoken to Felix Graham as he was going out to the judge's carriage on the last morning of the celebrated great Orley Farm case, and as she did so she twisted one of her little fingers into one of his buttonholes. This she did with a prettiness of familiarity, and the assumption of a right to give him orders and hold him to obedience, which was almost intoxicating in its sweetness. And why should she not be familiar with him? Why should she not hold him to obedience by his buttonhole? Was he not her own? Had she not chosen him and taken him up to the exclusion of all other such choosings and takings? 

"I shall not go till you send me," he said, putting up his hand as though to protect his coat, and just touching her fingers as he did so. 

"Mamma says it will be stupid for you in the mornings, but it will not be worse for you than for Augustus. He stays till after Easter." 

"And I shall stay till after Whitsuntide unless I am turned out." 

"Oh! but you will be turned out. I am not going to make myself answerable for any improper amount of idleness. Papa says you have got all the law courts to reform." 
What did Madeline tell Felix he must not do?
We must now go back to Noningsby for one concluding chapter, and then our work will be completed. "You are not to go away from Noningsby when the trial is over, you know. Mamma said that I had better tell you so." It was thus that Madeline had spoken to Felix Graham as he was going out to the judge's carriage on the last morning of the celebrated great Orley Farm case, and as she did so she twisted one of her little fingers into one of his buttonholes. This she did with a prettiness of familiarity, and the assumption of a right to give him orders and hold him to obedience, which was almost intoxicating in its sweetness. And why should she not be familiar with him? Why should she not hold him to obedience by his buttonhole? Was he not her own? Had she not chosen him and taken him up to the exclusion of all other such choosings and takings? 