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Title: The Eustace Diamonds

Author: Anthony Trollope

Release Date: January, 2005 [EBook #7381]
[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on April 22, 2003]

Edition: 10

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THE EUSTACE DIAMONDS

BY
ANTHONY TROLLOPE




CONTENTS


CHAPTER
      I. LIZZIE GREYSTOCK
     II. LADY EUSTACE
    III. LUCY MORRIS
     IV. FRANK GREYSTOCK
      V. THE EUSTACE NECKLACE
     VI. LADY LINLITHGOW'S MISSION
    VII. MR. BURKE'S SPEECHES
   VIII. THE CONQUERING HERO COMES
     IX. SHOWING WHAT THE MISS FAWNS SAID, AND WHAT MRS. HITTAWAY THOUGHT
      X. LIZZIE AND HER LOVER
     XI. LORD FAWN AT HIS OFFICE
    XII. I ONLY THOUGHT OF IT
   XIII. SHOWING WHAT FRANK GREYSTOCK DID
    XIV. "DOAN'T THOU MARRY FOR MUNNY!"
     XV. "I'LL GIVE YOU A HUNDRED-GUINEA BROOCH"
    XVI. CERTAINLY AN HEIRLOOM
   XVII. THE DIAMONDS ARE SEEN IN PUBLIC
  XVIII. AND I HAVE NOTHING TO GIVE
    XIX. AS MY BROTHER
     XX. THE DIAMONDS BECOME TROUBLESOME
    XXI. "IANTHE'S SOUL"
   XXII. LADY EUSTACE PROCURES A PONY FOR THE USE OF HER COUSIN
  XXIII. FRANK GREYSTOCK'S FIRST VISIT TO PORTRAY
   XXIV. SHOWING WHAT FRANK GREYSTOCK THOUGHT ABOUT MARRIAGE
    XXV. MR. DOVE'S OPINION
   XXVI. MR. GOWRAN IS VERY FUNNY
  XXVII. LUCY MORRIS MISBEHAVES
 XXVIII. MR. DOVE IN HIS CHAMBERS
   XXIX. I HAD BETTER GO AWAY
    XXX. MR. GREYSTOCK'S TROUBLES
   XXXI. FRANK GREYSTOCK'S SECOND VISIT TO PORTRAY
  XXXII. MR. AND MRS. HITTAWAY IN SCOTLAND
 XXXIII. IT WON'T BE TRUE
  XXXIV. LADY LINLITHGOW AT HOME
   XXXV. TOO BAD FOR SYMPATHY
  XXXVI. LIZZIE'S GUESTS
 XXXVII. LIZZIE'S FIRST DAY
XXXVIII. NAPPIE'S GRAY HORSE
  XXXIX. SIR GRIFFIN TAKES AN UNFAIR ADVANTAGE
     XL. YOU ARE NOT ANGRY
    XLI. LIKEWISE THE BEARS IN COUPLES AGREE
   XLII. SUNDAY MORNING
  XLIII. LIFE AT PORTRAY
   XLIV. A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE
    XLV. THE JOURNEY TO LONDON
   XLVI. LUCY MORRIS IN BROOK STREET
  XLVII. MATCHING PRIORY
 XLVIII. LIZZIE'S CONDITION
   XLIX. BUNFIT AND GAGER
      L. IN HERTFORD STREET
     LI. CONFIDENCE
    LII. MRS. CARBUNCLE GOES TO THE THEATRE
   LIII. LIZZIE'S SICK-ROOM
    LIV. "I SUPPOSE I MAY SAY A WORD"
     LV. QUINTS OR SEMITENTHS
    LVI. JOB'S COMFORTERS
   LVII. HUMPTY DUMPTY
  LVIII. THE "FIDDLE WITH ONE STRING"
    LIX. MR. GOWRAN UP IN LONDON
     LX. LET IT BE AS THOUGH IT HAD NEVER BEEN
    LXI. LIZZIE'S GREAT FRIEND
   LXII. "YOU KNOW WHERE MY HEART IS"
  LXIII. THE CORSAIR IS AFRAID
   LXIV. LIZZIE'S LAST SCHEME
    LXV. TRIBUTE
   LXVI. THE ASPIRATIONS OF MR. EMILIUS
  LXVII. THE EYE OF THE PUBLIC
 LXVIII. THE MAJOR
   LXIX. "I CANNOT DO IT"
    LXX. ALAS!
   LXXI. LIZZIE IS THREATENED WITH THE TREADMILL
  LXXII. LIZZIE'S TRIUMPHS
 LXXIII. LIZZIE'S LAST LOVER
  LXXIV. LIZZIE AT THE POLICE-COURT
   LXXV. LORD GEORGE GIVES HIS REASONS
  LXXVI. LIZZIE RETURNS TO SCOTLAND
 LXXVII. THE STORY OF LUCY MORRIS IS CONCLUDED
LXXVIII. THE TRIAL
  LXXIX. ONCE MORE AT PORTRAY
   LXXX. WHAT WAS SAID ABOUT IT ALL AT MATCHING




THE EUSTACE DIAMONDS




CHAPTER I

LIZZIE GREYSTOCK


It was admitted by all her friends, and also by her enemies--who were in
truth the more numerous and active body of the two--that Lizzie Greystock
had done very well with herself. We will tell the story of Lizzie
Greystock from the beginning, but we will not dwell over it at great
length, as we might do if we loved her. She was the only child of old
Admiral Greystock, who in the latter years of his life was much perplexed
by the possession of a daughter. The admiral was a man who liked whist,
wine--and wickedness in general we may perhaps say, and whose ambition it
was to live every day of his life up to the end of it. People say that he
succeeded, and that the whist, wine, and wickedness were there, at the
side even of his dying bed. He had no particular fortune, and yet his
daughter, when she was little more than a child, went about everywhere
with jewels on her fingers, and red gems hanging round her neck, and
yellow gems pendent from her ears, and white gems shining in her black
hair. She was hardly nineteen when her father died and she was taken home
by that dreadful old termagant, her aunt, Lady Linlithgow. Lizzie would
have sooner gone to any other friend or relative, had there been any other
friend or relative to take her possessed of a house in town. Her uncle,
Dean Greystock, of Bobsborough, would have had her--and a more good-
natured old soul than the dean's wife did not exist, and there were three
pleasant, good-tempered girls in the deanery, who had made various little
efforts at friendship with their cousin Lizzie--but Lizzie had higher
ideas for herself than life in the deanery at Bobsborough. She hated Lady
Linlithgow. During her father's lifetime, when she hoped to be able to
settle herself before his death, she was not in the habit of concealing
her hatred for Lady Linlithgow. Lady Linlithgow was not indeed amiable or
easily managed. But when the admiral died, Lizzie did not hesitate for a
moment in going to the old "vulturess," as she was in the habit of calling
the countess in her occasional correspondence with the girls at
Bobsborough.

The admiral died greatly in debt--so much so that it was a marvel how
tradesmen had trusted him. There was literally nothing left for anybody;
and Messrs. Harter & Benjamin of Old Bond Street condescended to call at
Lady Linlithgow's house in Brook Street, and to beg that the jewels
supplied during the last twelve months might be returned. Lizzie protested
that there were no jewels--nothing to signify, nothing worth restoring.
Lady Linlithgow had seen the diamonds, and demanded an explanation. They
had been "parted with," by the admiral's orders--so said Lizzie--for the
payment of other debts. Of this Lady Linlithgow did not believe a word,
but she could not get at any exact truth. At that moment the jewels were
in very truth pawned for money which had been necessary for Lizzie's
needs. Certain things must be paid for--one's own maid for instance--and
one must have some money in one's pocket for railway-trains and little
knick-knacks which cannot be had on credit. Lizzie when she was nineteen
knew how to do without money as well as most girls; but there were calls
which she could not withstand, debts which even she must pay.

She did not, however, drop her acquaintance with Messrs. Harter &
Benjamin. Before her father had been dead eight months, she was closeted
with Mr. Benjamin, transacting a little business with him. She had come to
him, she told him, the moment she was of age, and was willing to make
herself responsible for the debt, signing any bill, note, or document
which the firm might demand from her to that effect. Of course she had
nothing of her own, and never would have anything. That Mr. Benjamin knew.
As for payment of the debt by Lady Linlithgow, who for a countess was as
poor as Job, Mr. Benjamin, she was quite sure, did not expect anything of
the kind. But----. Then Lizzie paused, and Mr. Benjamin, with the sweetest
and wittiest of smiles, suggested that perhaps Miss Greystock was going to
be married. Lizzie, with a pretty maiden blush, admitted that such a
catastrophe was probable. She had been asked in marriage by Sir Florian
Eustace. Now Mr. Benjamin knew, as all the world knew, that Sir Florian
Eustace was a very rich man indeed; a man in no degree embarrassed, and
who could pay any amount of jewellers' bills for which claim might be made
upon him. Well, what did Miss Greystock want? Mr. Benjamin did not suppose
that Miss Greystock was actuated simply by a desire to have her old bills
paid by her future husband. Miss Greystock wanted a loan sufficient to
take the jewels out of pawn. She would then make herself responsible for
the full amount due. Mr. Benjamin said that he would make a few inquiries.
"But you won't betray me," said Lizzie, "for the match might be off." Mr.
Benjamin promised to be more than cautious.

There was not so much of falsehood as might have been expected in the
statement which Lizzie Greystock made to the jeweller. It was not true
that she was of age, and therefore no future husband would be legally
liable for any debt which she might then contract; and it was not true
that Sir Florian Eustace had asked her in marriage. Those two little
blemishes in her statement must be admitted. But it was true that Sir
Florian was at her feet, and that by a proper use of her various charms,
the pawned jewels included, she might bring him to an offer. Mr. Benjamin
made his inquiries, and acceded to the proposal. He did not tell Miss
Greystock that she had lied to him in that matter of her age, though he
had discovered the lie. Sir Florian would no doubt pay the bill for his
wife without any arguments as to the legality of the claim. From such
information as Mr. Benjamin could acquire, he thought that there would be
a marriage, and that the speculation was on the whole in his favour.
Lizzie recovered her jewels and Mr. Benjamin was in possession of a
promissory note purporting to have been executed by a person who was no
longer a minor. The jeweller was ultimately successful in his views, and
so was the lady.

Lady Linlithgow saw the jewels come back, one by one, ring added to ring
on the little taper fingers, the rubies for the neck and the pendent
yellow earrings. Though Lizzie was in mourning for her father, still these
things were allowed to be visible. The countess was not the woman to see
them without inquiry, and she inquired vigorously. She threatened,
stormed, and protested. She attempted even a raid upon the young lady's
jewel-box. But she was not successful. Lizzie snapped and snarled and held
her own, for at that time the match with Sir Florian was near its
accomplishment, and the countess understood too well the value of such a
disposition of her niece to risk it at the moment by any open rupture. The
little house in Brook Street--for the house was very small and very
comfortless--a house that had been squeezed in, as it were, between two
others without any fitting space for it--did not contain a happy family.
One bedroom, and that the biggest, was appropriated to the Earl of
Linlithgow, the son of the countess, a young man who passed perhaps five
nights in town during the year. Other inmate there was none besides the
aunt and the niece and the four servants, of whom one was Lizzie's own
maid. Why should such a countess have troubled herself with the custody of
such a niece? Simply because the countess regarded it as a duty. Lady
Linlithgow was worldly, stingy, ill-tempered, selfish, and mean. Lady
Linlithgow would cheat a butcher out of a mutton chop, or a cook out of a
month's wages, if she could do so with some slant of legal wind in her
favour. She would tell any number of lies to carry a point in what she
believed to be social success. It was said of her that she cheated at
cards. In back-biting, no venomous old woman between Bond Street and Park
Lane could beat her--or, more wonderful still, no venomous old man at the
clubs. But nevertheless she recognised certain duties, and performed them,
though she hated them. She went to church, not merely that people might
see her there--as to which in truth she cared nothing--but because she
thought it was right. And she took in Lizzie Greystock, whom she hated
almost as much as she did sermons, because the admiral's wife had been her
sister, and she recognised a duty. But, having thus bound herself to
Lizzie--who was a beauty--of course it became the first object of her life
to get rid of Lizzie by a marriage. And though she would have liked to
think that Lizzie would be tormented all her days, though she thoroughly
believed that Lizzie deserved to be tormented, she set her heart upon a
splendid match. She would at any rate be able to throw it daily in her
niece's teeth that the splendour was of her doing. Now a marriage with Sir
Florian Eustace would be very splendid, and therefore she was unable to go
into the matter of the jewels with that rigour which in other
circumstances she would certainly have displayed.

The match with Sir Florian Eustace--for a match it came to be--was
certainly very splendid. Sir Florian was a young man about eight and
twenty, very handsome, of immense wealth, quite unencumbered, moving in
the best circles, popular, so far prudent that he never risked his fortune
on the turf or in gambling-houses, with the reputation of a gallant
soldier, and a most devoted lover. There were two facts concerning him
which might, or might not, be taken as objections. He was vicious, and--he
was dying. When a friend, intending to be kind, hinted the latter
circumstance to Lady Linlithgow, the countess blinked and winked and
nodded, and then swore that she had procured medical advice on the
subject. Medical advice declared that Sir Florian was not more likely to
die than another man--if only he would get married; all of which statement
on her ladyship's part was a lie. When the same friend hinted the same
thing to Lizzie herself, Lizzie resolved that she would have her revenge
upon that friend. At any rate the courtship went on.

We have said that Sir Florian was vicious; but he was not altogether a bad
man, nor was he vicious in the common sense of the word. He was one who
denied himself no pleasure let the cost be what it might in health,
pocket, or morals. Of sin or wickedness he had probably no distinct idea.
In virtue, as an attribute of the world around him, he had no belief. Of
honour he thought very much, and had conceived a somewhat noble idea that
because much had been given to him much was demanded of him. He was
haughty, polite, and very generous. There was almost a nobility even about
his vices. And he had a special gallantry of which it is hard to say
whether it is or is not to be admired. They told him that he was like to
die--very like to die, if he did not change his manner of living. Would he
go to Algiers for a period? Certainly not. He would do no such thing. If
he died, there was his brother John left to succeed him. And the fear of
death never cast a cloud over that grandly beautiful brow. They had all
been short-lived--the Eustaces. Consumption had swept a hecatomb of
victims from the family. But still they were grand people, and never were
afraid of death.

And then Sir Florian fell in love. Discussing this matter with his
brother, who was perhaps his only intimate friend, he declared that if the
girl he loved would give herself to him, he would make what atonement he
could to her for his own early death by a princely settlement. John
Eustace, who was somewhat nearly concerned in the matter, raised no
objection to this proposal. There was ever something grand about these
Eustaces. Sir Florian was a grand gentleman; but surely he must have been
dull of intellect, slow of discernment, blear-eyed in his ways about the
town, when he took Lizzie Greystock--of all the women whom he could find
in the world--to be the purest, the truest, and the noblest. It has been
said of Sir Florian that he did not believe in virtue. He freely expressed
disbelief in the virtue of women around him--in the virtue of women of all
ranks. But he believed in his mother and sisters as though they were
heaven-born; and he was one who could believe in his wife as though she
were the queen of heaven. He did believe in Lizzie Greystock, thinking
that intellect, purity, truth, and beauty, each perfect in its degree,
were combined in her. The intellect and beauty were there; but for the
purity and truth, how could it have been that such a one as Sir Florian
Eustace should have been so blind!

Sir Florian was not indeed a clever man; but he believed himself to be a
fool, and believing himself to be a fool, he desired, nay, painfully
longed, for some of those results of cleverness which might, he thought,
come to him from contact with a clever woman. Lizzie read poetry well, and
she read verses to him, sitting very near to him, almost in the dark, with
a shaded lamp throwing its light on her book. He was astonished to find
how sweet a thing was poetry. By himself he could never read a line, but
as it came from her lips it seemed to charm him. It was a new pleasure,
and one which, though he had ridiculed it, he had so often coveted! And
then she told him of such wondrous thoughts, such wondrous joys in the
world which would come from thinking! He was proud, I have said, and
haughty; but he was essentially modest and humble in his self-estimation.
How divine was this creature, whose voice to him was that of a goddess!

Then he spoke out to her with a face a little turned from her. Would she
be his wife? But before she answered him, let her listen to him. They had
told him that an early death must probably be his fate. He did not himself
feel that it must be so. Sometimes he was ill, very ill; but often he was
well. If she would run the risk with him he Would endeavour to make her
such recompense as might come from his wealth. The speech he made was
somewhat long, and as he made it he hardly looked into her face.

But it was necessary to him that he should be made to know by some signal
from her how it was going with her feelings. As he spoke of his danger,
there came a gurgling little trill of wailing from her throat, a soft,
almost musical, sound of woe, which seemed to add an unaccustomed
eloquence to his words. When he spoke of his own hope the sound was
somewhat, changed, but it was still continued. When he alluded to the
disposition of his fortune, she was at his feet. "Not that," she said,
"not that!" He lifted her, and with his arm round her waist he tried to
tell her what it would be his duty to do for her. She escaped from his arm
and would not listen to him. But--but--! When he began to talk of love
again, she stood with her forehead bowed against his bosom. Of course the
engagement was then a thing accomplished.

But still the cup might slip from her lips. Her father was now dead but
ten months, and what answer could she make when the common pressing
petition for an early marriage was poured into her ear? This was in July,
and it would never do that he should be left, unmarried, to the rigour of
another winter. She looked into his face and knew that she had cause for
fear. Oh, heavens! if all these golden hopes should fall to the ground,
and she should come to be known only as the girl who had been engaged to
the late Sir Florian! But he himself pressed the marriage on the same
ground. "They tell me," he said, "that I had better get a little south by
the beginning of October. I won't go alone. You know what I mean--eh,
Lizzie?" Of course she married him in September.

They spent a honeymoon of six weeks at a place he had in Scotland, and the
first blow came upon him as they passed through London, back from
Scotland, on their way to Italy. Messrs. Harter & Benjamin sent in their
little bill, which amounted to something over £400, and other little bills
were sent in. Sir Florian was a man by whom all such bills would certainly
be paid, but by whom they would not be paid without his understanding much
and conceiving more as to their cause and nature. How much he really did
understand she was never quite aware; but she did know that he detected
her in a positive falsehood. She might certainly have managed the matter
better than she did; and had she admitted everything there might probably
have been but few words about it. She did not, however, understand the
nature of the note she had signed, and thought that simply new bills would
be presented by the jewellers to her husband. She gave a false account of
the transaction, and the lie was detected. I do not know that she cared
very much. As she was utterly devoid of true tenderness, so also was she
devoid of conscience. They went abroad, however; and by the time the
winter was half over in Naples, he knew what his wife was; and before the
end of the spring he was dead.

She had so far played her game well, and had won her stakes. What regrets,
what remorse she suffered when she knew that he was going from her, and
then knew that he was gone, who can say? As man is never strong enough to
take unmixed delight in good, so may we presume also that he cannot be
quite so weak as to find perfect satisfaction in evil. There must have
been qualms as she looked at his dying face, soured with the
disappointment she had brought upon him, and listened to the harsh
querulous voice that was no longer eager in the expressions of love. There
must have been some pang when she reflected that the cruel wrong which she
had inflicted on him had probably hurried him to his grave. As a widow, In
the first solemnity of her widowhood, she was wretched and would see no
one. Then she returned to England and shut herself up in a small house at
Brighton. Lady Linlithgow offered to go to her, but she begged that she
might be left to herself. For a few short months the awe arising from the
rapidity with which it had all occurred did afflict her. Twelve months
since she had hardly known the man who was to be her husband. Now she was
a widow--a widow very richly endowed--and she bore beneath her bosom the
fruit of her husband's love.

But, even in these early days, friends and enemies did not hesitate to say
that Lizzie Greystock had done very well with herself; for it was known by
all concerned that in the settlements made she had been treated with
unwonted generosity.




CHAPTER II

LADY EUSTACE


There were circumstances in her position which made it impossible that
Lizzie Greystock, or Lady Eustace, as we must now call her, should be left
altogether to herself in the modest widow's retreat which she had found at
Brighton. It was then April, and it was known that if all things went well
with her she would be a mother before the summer was over. On what the
Fates might ordain in this matter immense interests were dependent. If a
son should be born he would inherit everything, subject, of course, to his
mother's settlement. If a daughter, to her would belong the great personal
wealth which Sir Florian had owned at the time of his death. Should there
be no son, John Eustace, the brother, would inherit the estates in
Yorkshire which had been the backbone of the Eustace wealth. Should no
child be born, John Eustace would inherit everything that had not been
settled upon or left to the widow. Sir Florian had made a settlement
immediately before his marriage, and a will immediately afterwards. Of
what he had done then, nothing had been altered in those sad Italian days.
The settlement had been very generous. The whole property in Scotland was
to belong to Lizzie for her life, and after her death was to go to a
second son, if such second son there should be. By the will money was left
to her--more than would be needed for any possible temporary emergency.
When she knew how it all was arranged, as far as she did know it, she was
aware that she was a rich woman. For so clever a woman she was infinitely
ignorant as to the possession and value of money and land and income,
though, perhaps, not more ignorant than are most young girls under twenty-
one. As for the Scotch property, she thought that it was her own forever,
because there could not now be a second son, and yet was not quite sure
whether it would be her own at all if she had no son. Concerning that sum
of money left to her, she did not know whether it was to come out of the
Scotch property or be given to her separately, and whether it was to come
annually or to come only once. She had received, while still in Naples, a
letter from the family lawyer, giving her such details of the will as it
was necessary that she should know, and now she longed to ask questions,
to have her belongings made plain to her, and to realise her wealth. She
had brilliant prospects; and yet, through it all, there was a sense of
loneliness that nearly killed her. Would it not have been much better if
her husband would have lived, and still worshipped her, and still allowed
her to read poetry to him? But she had read no poetry to him after that
affair of Messrs. Harter & Benjamin.

This has, or will have, but little to do with these days, and may be
hurried on through the twelve, or even twenty-four, months which followed
the death of poor Sir Florian. The question of the heirship, however, was
very grave; and early in the month of May, Lady Eustace was visited by her
husband's uncle, Bishop Eustace, of Bobsborough. The bishop had been the
younger brother of Sir Florian's father, was at this time about fifty,
very active and very popular, and was one who stood high in the world,
even among bishops. He suggested to his niece-in-law that it was very
expedient that, during her coming hour of trial, she should not absent
herself from her husband's family, and at last persuaded her to take up
her residence at the palace at Bobsborough till such time as the event
should be over. Lady Eustace was taken to the palace, and in due time a
son was born. John, who was now the uncle of the heir, came down, and,
with the frankest good-humour, declared that he would devote himself to
the little head of the family. He had been left as guardian, and the
management of the great family estates was to be in his hands. Lizzie had
read no poetry to him, and he had never liked her, and the bishop did not
like her, and the ladies of the bishop's family disliked her very much,
and it was thought by them that the dean's people--the Dean of Bobsborough
was Lizzie's uncle--were not very fond of Lizzie since Lizzie had so
raised herself in the world as to want no assistance from them. But still
they were bound to do their duty by her as the widow of the late and the
mother of the present baronet. And they did not find much cause of
complaining as to Lizzie's conduct in these days. In that matter of the
great family diamond necklace, which certainly should not have been taken
to Naples at all, and as to which the jeweller had told the lawyer and the
lawyer had told John Eustace that it certainly should not now be detained
among the widow's own private property, the bishop strongly recommended
that nothing should be said at present. The mistake, if there was a
mistake, could be remedied at any time. And nothing in those very early
days was said about the great Eustace necklace which afterwards became so
famous.

Why Lizzie should have been so generally disliked by the Eustaces it might
be hard to explain. While she remained at the palace she was very
discreet, and perhaps demure. It may be said they disliked her expressed
determination to cut her aunt, Lady Linlithgow; for they knew that Lady
Linlithgow had been, at any rate, a friend to Lizzie Greystock. There are
people who can be wise within a certain margin, but beyond that commit
great imprudences. Lady Eustace submitted herself to the palace people for
that period of her prostration, but she could not hold her tongue as to
her future intentions. She would, too, now and then ask of Mrs. Eustace
and even of her daughter an eager, anxious question about her own
property. "She is dying to handle her money," said Mrs. Eustace to the
bishop. "She is only like the rest of the world in that," said the bishop.
"If she would be really open, I wouldn't mind it," said Mrs. Eustace. None
of them liked her, and she did not like them.

She remained at the palace for six months, and at the end of that time she
went to her own place in Scotland. Mrs. Eustace had strongly advised her
to ask her aunt, Lady Linlithgow, to accompany her, but in refusing to do
this Lizzie was quite firm. She had endured Lady Linlithgow for that year
between her father's death and her marriage; she was now beginning to dare
to hope for the enjoyment of the good things which she had won, and the
presence of the dowager countess, "the vulturess," was certainly not one
of these good things. In what her enjoyment was to consist, she had not as
yet quite formed a definite conclusion. She liked jewels. She liked
admiration. She liked the power of being arrogant to those around her. And
she liked good things to eat. But there were other matters that were also
dear to her. She did like music, though it may be doubted whether she
would ever play it or even listen to it alone. She did like reading, and
especially the reading of poetry, though even in this she was false and
pretentious, skipping, pretending to have read, lying about books, and
making up her market of literature for outside admiration at the easiest
possible cost of trouble. And she had some dream of being in love, and
would take delight even in building castles in the air, which she would
people with friends and lovers whom she would make happy with the most
open-hearted benevolence. She had theoretical ideas of life which were not
bad, but in practice she had gained her objects, and she was in a hurry to
have liberty to enjoy them.

There was considerable anxiety in the palace in reference to the future
mode of life of Lady Eustace. Had it not been for that baby-heir, of
course there would have been no cause for interference; but the rights of
that baby were so serious and important that it was almost impossible not
to interfere. The mother, however, gave some little signs that she did not
intend to submit to much interference, and there was no real reason why
she should not be as free as air. But did she really intend to go down to
Portray Castle all alone--that is, with her baby and nurses? This was
ended by an arrangement in accordance with which she was accompanied by
her eldest cousin, Ellinor Greystock, a lady who was just ten years her
senior. There could hardly be a better woman than Ellinor Greystock, or a
more good-humoured, kindly being. After many debates in the deanery and in
the palace, for there was much friendship between the two ecclesiastical
establishments, the offer was made and the advice given. Ellinor had
accepted the martyrdom on the understanding that if the advice were
accepted she was to remain at Portray Castle for three months. After a
long discussion between Lady Eustace and the bishop's wife the offer was
accepted, and the two ladies went to Scotland together.

During those three months the widow still bided her time. Of her future
ideas of life she said not a word to her companion. Of her infant she said
very little. She would talk of books, choosing such books as her cousin
did not read; and she would interlard her conversation with much Italian,
because her cousin did not know the language. There was a carriage kept by
the widow, and they had themselves driven out together. Of real
companionship there was none. Lizzie was biding her time, and at the end
of the three months Miss Greystock thankfully, and, indeed, of necessity,
returned to Bobsborough. "I've done no good," she said to her mother, "and
have been very uncomfortable." "My dear," said her mother, "we have
disposed of three months out of a two years' period of danger. In two
years from Sir Florian's death she will be married again."

When this was said Lizzie had been a widow nearly a year, and had bided
her time upon the whole discreetly. Some foolish letters she had written,
chiefly to the lawyer about her money and property; and some foolish
things she had said, as when she told Ellinor Greystock that the Portray
property was her own forever, to do what she liked with it. The sum of
money left to her by her husband had by that time been paid into her own
hands, and she had opened a banker's account. The revenues from the Scotch
estate, some £4,000 a year, were clearly her own for life. The family
diamond necklace was still in her possession, and no answer had been given
by her to a postscript to a lawyer's letter in which a little advice had
been given respecting it. At the end of another year, when she had just
reached the age of twenty-two, and had completed her second year of
widowhood, she was still Lady Eustace, thus contradicting the prophecy
made by the dean's wife. It was then spring, and she had a house of her
own in London. She had broken openly with Lady Linlithgow. She had
opposed, though not absolutely refused, all overtures of brotherly care
from John Eustace. She had declined a further invitation, both for herself
and for her child, to the palace. And she had positively asserted her
intention of keeping the diamonds. Her late husband, she said, had given
the diamonds to her. As they were supposed to be worth £10,000, and were
really family diamonds, the matter was felt by all concerned to be one of
much importance. And she was oppressed by a heavy load of ignorance, which
became serious from the isolation of her position. She had learned to draw
cheques, but she had no other correct notion as to business. She knew
nothing as to spending money, saving it, or investing it. Though she was
clever, sharp, and greedy, she had no idea what her money would do, and
what it would not; and there was no one whom she would trust to tell her.
She had a young cousin, a barrister, a son of the dean's, whom she perhaps
liked better than any other of her relations, but she declined advice even
from her friend the barrister. She would have no dealings on her own
behalf with the old family solicitor of the Eustaces, the gentleman who
had now applied very formally for the restitution of the diamonds, but had
appointed other solicitors to act for her. Messrs. Mowbray & Mopus were of
opinion that as the diamonds had been given into her hands by her husband
without any terms as to their surrender, no one could claim them. Of the
manner in which the diamonds had been placed in her hands no one knew more
than she chose to tell.

But when she started with her house in town--a modest little house in
Mount Street, near the park--just two years after her husband's death, she
had a large circle of acquaintances. The Eustace people, and the Greystock
people, and even the Linlithgow people, did not entirely turn their backs
upon her. The countess, indeed, was very venomous, as she well might be;
but then the countess was known for her venom. The dean and his family
were still anxious that she should be encouraged to discreet living, and,
though they feared many things, thought that they had no ground for open
complaint. The Eustace people were forbearing, and hoped the best. "D---
the necklace," John Eustace had said, and the bishop unfortunately had
heard him say it! "John," said the prelate, "whatever is to become of the
bauble you might express your opinion in more sensible language." "I beg
your lordship's pardon," said John, "I only mean to say that I think we
shouldn't trouble ourselves about a few stones." But the family lawyer,
Mr. Camperdown, would by no means take this view of the matter. It was,
however, generally thought that the young widow opened her campaign more
prudently than had been expected.

And now as so much has been said of the character and fortune and special
circumstances of Lizzie Greystock, who became Lady Eustace as a bride, and
Lady Eustace as a widow and a mother, all within the space of twelve
months, it may be as well to give some description of her person and
habits, such as they were at the period in which our story is supposed to
have its commencement. It must be understood in the first place that she
was very lovely; much more so, indeed, now than when she had fascinated
Sir Florian. She was small, but taller than she looked to be, for her form
was perfectly symmetrical. Her feet and hands might have been taken as
models by a sculptor. Her figure was lithe, and soft, and slim, and
slender. If it had a fault it was this, that it had in it too much of
movement. There were some who said that she was almost snake-like in her
rapid bendings and the almost too easy gestures of her body; for she was
much given to action and to the expression of her thought by the motion of
her limbs. She might certainly have made her way as an actress, had
fortune called upon her to earn her bread in that fashion. And her voice
would have suited the stage. It was powerful when she called upon it for
power; but, at the same time, flexible and capable of much pretence at
feeling. She could bring it to a whisper that would almost melt your heart
with tenderness, as she had melted Sir Florian's, when she sat near to him
reading poetry; and then she could raise it to a pitch of indignant wrath
befitting a Lady Macbeth when her husband ventured to rebuke her. And her
ear was quite correct in modulating these tones. She knew--and it must
have been by instinct, for her culture in such matters was small--how to
use her voice so that neither its tenderness nor its wrath should be
misapplied. There were pieces in verse that she could read, things not
wondrously good in themselves, so that she would ravish you; and she would
so look at you as she did it that you would hardly dare either to avert
your eyes or to return her gaze. Sir Florian had not known whether to do
the one thing or the other, and had therefore seized her in his arms. Her
face was oval--somewhat longer than an oval--with little in it, perhaps
nothing in it, of that brilliancy of colour which we call complexion. And
yet the shades of her countenance were ever changing between the softest
and most transparent white and the richest, mellowest shades of brown. It
was only when she simulated anger--she was almost incapable of real anger
--that she would succeed in calling the thinnest streak of pink from her
heart, to show that there was blood running in her veins. Her hair, which
was nearly black, but in truth with more of softness and of lustre than
ever belong to hair that is really black, she wore bound tight round her
perfect forehead, with one long lovelock hanging over her shoulder. The
form of her head was so good that she could dare to carry it without a
chignon or any adventitious adjuncts from an artist's shop. Very bitter
was she in consequence when speaking of the head-gear of other women. Her
chin was perfect in its round--not over long, as is the case with so many
such faces, utterly spoiling the symmetry of the countenance. But it
lacked a dimple, and therefore lacked feminine tenderness. Her mouth was
perhaps faulty in being too small, or, at least, her lips were too thin.
There was wanting from the mouth that expression of eager-speaking
truthfulness which full lips will often convey. Her teeth were without
flaw or blemish, even, small, white, and delicate; but perhaps they were
shown too often. Her nose was small, but struck many as the prettiest
feature of her face, so exquisite was the moulding of it, and so eloquent
and so graceful the slight inflations of the transparent nostrils. Her
eyes, in which she herself thought that the lustre of her beauty lay, were
blue and clear, bright as cerulean waters. They were long, large eyes, but
very dangerous. To those who knew how to read a face, there was danger
plainly written in them. Poor Sir Florian had not known. But, in truth,
the charm of her face did not lie in her eyes. This was felt by many even
who could not read the book fluently. They were too expressive, too loud
in their demands for attention, and they lacked tenderness. How few there
are among women, few perhaps also among men, who know that the sweetest,
softest, tenderest, truest eyes which a woman can carry in her head are
green in colour. Lizzie's eyes were not tender, neither were they true.
But they were surmounted by the most wonderfully pencilled eyebrows that
ever nature unassisted planted on a woman's face.

We have said she was clever. We must add that she had in truth studied
much. She spoke French, understood Italian, and read German. She played
well on the harp, and moderately well on the piano. She sang, at least, in
good taste and good tune. Of things to be learned by reading she knew
much, having really taken diligent trouble with herself. She had learned
much poetry by heart, and could apply it. She forgot nothing, listened to
everything, understood quickly, and was desirous to show not only as a
beauty but as a wit. There were men at this time who declared that she was
simply the cleverest and the handsomest woman in England. As an
independent young woman she was perhaps one of the richest.




CHAPTER III

LUCY MORRIS


Although the first two chapters of this new history have been devoted to
the fortunes and personal attributes of Lady Eustace, the historian begs
his readers not to believe that that opulent and aristocratic Becky Sharp
is to assume the dignity of heroine in the forthcoming pages. That there
shall be any heroine the historian will not take upon himself to assert;
but if there be a heroine, that heroine shall not be Lady Eustace.

Poor Lizzie Greystock! as men double her own age, and who had known her as
a forward, capricious, spoiled child in her father's lifetime, would still
call her. She did so many things, made so many efforts, caused so much
suffering to others, and suffered so much herself throughout the scenes
with which we are about to deal, that the story can hardly be told without
giving her that prominence of place which has been assigned to her in the
last two chapters.

Nor does the chronicler dare to put forward Lucy Morris as a heroine. The
real heroine, if it be found possible to arrange her drapery for her
becomingly, and to put that part which she enacted into properly heroic
words, shall stalk in among us at some considerably later period in the
narrative, when the writer shall have accustomed himself to the flow of
words, and have worked himself up to a state of mind fit for the reception
of noble acting and noble speaking. In the meantime, let it be understood
that poor little Lucy Morris was a governess in the house of old Lady Fawn
when our beautiful young widow established herself in Mount street.

Lady Eustace and Lucy Morris had known each other for many years--had
indeed been children together, there having been some old family
friendship between the Greystocks and the Morrises. When the admiral's
wife was living, Lucy had, as a little girl of eight or nine, been her
guest. She had often been a guest at the deanery. When Lady Eustace had
gone down to the bishop's palace at Bobsborough, in order that an heir to
the Eustaces might be born under an auspicious roof, Lucy Morris was with
the Greystocks. Lucy, who was a year younger than Lizzie, had at that time
been an orphan for the last four years. She too had been left penniless,
but no such brilliant future awaited her as that which Lizzie had earned
for herself. There was no countess-aunt to take her into her London house.
The dean and the dean's wife and the dean's daughters had been her best
friends, but they were not friends on whom she could be dependent. They
were in no way connected with her by blood. Therefore at the age of
eighteen she had gone out to be a child's governess. Then old Lady Fawn
had heard of her virtues--Lady Fawn who had seven unmarried daughters
running down from seven-and-twenty to thirteen, and Lucy Morris had been
hired to teach English, French, German, and something of music to the two
youngest Misses Fawn.

During that visit at the deanery, when the heir of the Eustaces was being
born, Lucy was undergoing a sort of probation for the Fawn establishment.
The proposed engagement with Lady Fawn was thought to be a great thing for
her. Lady Fawn was known as a miracle of Virtue, Benevolence, and
Persistency. Every good quality she possessed was so marked as to be
worthy of being expressed with a capital. But her virtues were of that
extraordinary high character that there was no weakness in them; no
getting over them; no perverting them with follies, or even exaggerations.
When she heard of the excellencies of Miss Morris from the dean's wife,
and then, after minutest investigation, learned the exact qualities of the
young lady, she expressed herself willing to take Lucy into her house on
special conditions. She must be able to teach music up to a certain point.

"Then it's all over," said Lucy to the dean with her pretty smile--that
smile which caused all the old and middle-aged men to fall in love with
her.

"It's not over at all," said the dean. "You've got four months. Our
organist is about as good a teacher as there is in England. You are clever
and quick, and he shall teach you."

So Lucy went to Bobsborough and was afterwards accepted by Lady Fawn.

While she was at the deanery there sprung up a renewed friendship between
her and Lizzie. It was indeed chiefly a one-sided friendship; for Lucy,
who was quick and unconsciously capable of reading that book to which we
alluded in a previous chapter, was somewhat afraid of the rich widow. And
when Lizzie talked to her of their old childish days, and quoted poetry,
and spoke of things romantic--as she was much given to do--Lucy felt that
the metal did not ring true. And then Lizzie had an ugly habit of abusing
all her other friends behind their backs. Now Lucy did not like to hear
the Greystocks abused, and would say so. "That's all very well, you little
minx," Lizzie would say playfully, "but you know they are all asses." Lucy
by no means thought that the Greystocks were asses, and was very strongly
of opinion that one of them was as far removed from being an ass as any
human being she had ever known. This one was Frank Greystock the
barrister. Of Frank Greystock some special--but, let it be hoped, very
short--description must be given by and by. For the present it will be
sufficient to declare that, during that short Easter holiday which he
spent at his father's house in Bobsborough, he found Lucy Morris to be a
most agreeable companion.

"Remember her position," said Mrs. Dean to her son.

"Her position! Well, and what is her position, mother?"

"You know what I mean, Frank. She is as sweet a girl as ever lived, and a
perfect lady. But with a governess, unless you mean to marry her, you
should be more careful than with another girl, because you may do her such
a world of mischief."

"I don't see that at all."

"If Lady Fawn knew that she had an admirer, Lady Fawn would not let her
come into her house."

"Then Lady Fawn is an idiot. If a girl be admirable, of course she will be
admired. Who can hinder it?"

"You know what I mean, Frank."

"Yes, I do; well. I don't suppose I can afford to marry Lucy Morris. At
any rate, mother, I will never say a word to raise a hope in her--if it
would be a hope--"

"Of course it would be a hope."

"I don't know that at all. But I will never say any such word to her,
unless I make up my mind that I can afford to marry her."

"Oh, Frank, it would be impossible," said Mrs. Dean.

Mrs. Dean was a very good woman, but she had aspirations in the direction
of filthy lucre on behalf of her children, or at least on behalf of this
special child, and she did think it would be very nice if Frank would
marry an heiress. This, however, was a long time ago--nearly two years
ago; and many grave things had got themselves transacted since Lucy's
visit to the deanery. She had become quite an old and an accustomed member
of Lady Fawn's family. The youngest Fawn girl was not yet fifteen, and it
was understood that Lucy was to remain with the Fawns for some quite
indefinite time to come. Lady Fawn's eldest daughter, Mrs. Hittaway, had a
family of her own, having been married ten or twelve years, and it was
quite probable that Lucy might be transferred. Lady Fawn fully appreciated
her treasure, and was, and ever had been, conscientiously anxious to make
Lucy's life happy. But she thought that a governess should not be desirous
of marrying, at any rate till a somewhat advanced period of life. A
governess, if she were given to falling in love, could hardly perform her
duties in life. No doubt, not to be a governess, but a young lady free
from the embarrassing necessity of earning bread, free to have a lover and
a husband, would be upon the whole nicer. So it is nicer to be born to
£10,000 a year than to have to wish for £500. Lady Fawn could talk
excellent sense on this subject by the hour, and always admitted that much
was due to a governess who knew her place and did her duty. She was very
fond of Lucy Morris, and treated her dependent with affectionate
consideration; but she did not approve of visits from Mr. Frank Greystock.
Lucy, blushing up to the eyes, had once declared that she desired to have
no personal visitors at Lady Fawn's house; but that, as regarded her own
friendships, the matter was one for her own bosom. "Dear Miss Morris,"
Lady Fawn had said, "we understand each other so perfectly, and you are so
good, that I am quite sure everything will be as it ought to be." Lady
Fawn lived down at Richmond, all the year through, in a large old-
fashioned house with a large old-fashioned garden, called Fawn Court.
After that speech of hers to Lucy, Frank Greystock did not call again at
Fawn Court for many months, and it is possible that her ladyship had said
a word also to him. But Lady Eustace, with her pretty little pair of gray
ponies, would sometimes drive down to Richmond to see her "dear little old
friend" Lucy, and her visits were allowed. Lady Fawn had expressed an
opinion among her daughters that she did not see any harm in Lady Eustace.
She thought that she rather liked Lady Eustace. But then Lady Fawn hated
Lady Linlithgow as only two old women can hate each other; and she had not
heard the story of the diamond necklace.

Lucy Morris certainly was a treasure--a treasure though no heroine. She
was a sweetly social, genial little human being whose presence in the
house was ever felt to be like sunshine. She was never forward, but never
bashful. She was always open to familiar intercourse without ever putting
herself forward. There was no man or woman with whom she would not so talk
as to make the man or woman feel that the conversation was remarkably
pleasant, and she could do the same with any child. She was an active,
mindful, bright, energetic little thing to whom no work ever came amiss.
She had catalogued the library, which had been collected by the late Lord
Fawn with peculiar reference to the Christian theology of the third and
fourth centuries. She had planned the new flower-garden, though Lady Fawn
thought that she had done that herself. She had been invaluable during
Clara Fawn's long illness. She knew every rule at croquet, and could play
piquet. When the girls got up charades they had to acknowledge that
everything depended on Miss Morris. They were good-natured, plain,
unattractive girls, who spoke of her to her face as one who could easily
do anything to which she might put her hand. Lady Fawn did really love
her. Lord Fawn, the eldest son, a young man of about thirty-five, a peer
of Parliament and an Undersecretary of State, very prudent and very
diligent, of whom his mother and sisters stood in great awe, consulted her
frequently and made no secret of his friendship. The mother knew her awful
son well, and was afraid of nothing wrong in that direction. Lord Fawn had
suffered a disappointment in love, but he had consoled himself with blue
books, and mastered his passion by incessant attendance at the India
Board. The lady he had loved had been rich, and Lord Fawn was poor; but
nevertheless he had mastered his passion. There was no fear that his
feelings toward the governess would become too warm; nor was it likely
that Miss Morris should encounter danger in regard to him. It was quite an
understood thing in the family that Lord Fawn must marry money.

Lucy Morris was indeed a treasure. No brighter face ever looked into
another to seek sympathy there, either in mirth or woe. There was a gleam
in her eyes that was almost magnetic, so sure was she to obtain by it that
community of interest which she desired, though it were but for a moment.
Lord Fawn was pompous, slow, dull, and careful; but even he had given way
to it at once. Lady Fawn, too, was very careful, but she had owned to
herself long since that she could not bear to look forward to any
permanent severance. Of course Lucy would be made over to the Hittaways,
whose mother lived in Warwick Square, and whose father was Chairman of the
Board of Civil Appeals. The Hittaways were the only grandchildren with
whom Lady Fawn had as yet been blessed, and of course Lucy must go the
Hittaways.

She was but a little thing; and it cannot be said of her, as of Lady
Eustace, that she was a beauty. The charm of her face consisted in the
peculiar, watery brightness of her eyes, in the corners of which it would
always seem that a diamond of a tear was lurking whenever any matter of
excitement was afoot. Her light-brown hair was soft and smooth and pretty.
As hair it was very well, but it had no specialty. Her mouth was somewhat
large, but full of ever-varying expression. Her forehead was low and
broad, with prominent temples, on which it Was her habit to clasp tightly
her little outstretched fingers, as she sat listening to you. Of listeners
she was the very best, for she would always be saying a word or two, just
to help you--the best word that could be spoken--and then again she would
be hanging on your lips. There are listeners who show by their mode of
listening that they listen as a duty, not because they are interested.
Lucy Morris was not such a one. She would take up your subject, whatever
it was, and make it her own. There was forward just then a question as to
whether the Sawab of Mygawb should have twenty millions of rupees paid to
him and be placed upon a throne, or whether he should be kept in prison
all his life. The British world generally could not be made to interest
itself about the Sawab, but Lucy positively mastered the subject, and
almost got Lord Fawn into a difficulty by persuading him to stand up
against his chief on behalf of the injured Prince.

What else can be said of her face or personal appearance that will
interest a reader? When she smiled there was the daintiest little dimple
on her cheek. And when she laughed, that little nose, which was not as
well-shaped a nose as it might have been, would almost change its shape
and cock itself up in its mirth. Her hands were very thin and long, and so
were her feet--by no means models as were those of her friend Lady
Eustace. She was a little, thin, quick, graceful creature, whom it was
impossible that you should see without wishing to have near you. A most
unselfish little creature she was, but one who had a well-formed idea of
her own identity. She was quite resolved to be somebody among her fellow-
creatures--not somebody in the way of marrying a lord or a rich man, or
somebody in the way of being a beauty, or somebody as a wit, but somebody
as having a purpose and a use in life. She was the humblest little thing
in the world in regard to any possible putting of herself forward or
needful putting of herself back; and yet, to herself; nobody was her
superior. What she had was her own, whether it was the old grey silk dress
which she had bought with the money she had earned, or the wit which
nature had given her. And Lord Fawn's title was his own, and Lady Fawn's
rank her own. She coveted no man's possessions, and no woman's; but she
was minded to hold by her own. Of present advantages or disadvantages--
whether she had the one or suffered from the other--she thought not at
all. It was her fault that she had nothing of feminine vanity. But no man
or woman was ever more anxious to be effective, to persuade, to obtain
belief, sympathy, and co-operation--not for any result personal to
herself, but because by obtaining these things she could be effective in
the object then before her, be what it might.

One other thing may be told of her. She had given her heart, for good and
all, as she owned to herself, to Frank Greystock. She had owned to herself
that it was so, and had owned to herself that nothing could come of it.
Frank was becoming a man of mark, but was becoming a man of mark without
much money. Of all men he was the last who could afford to marry a
governess. And then, moreover, he had never said a word to make her think
that he loved her. He had called on her once or twice at Fawn Court, as
why should he not? Seeing that there had been friendship between the
families for so many years, who could complain of that? Lady Fawn,
however, had not complained; but just said a word. A word in season, how
good is it? Lucy did not much regard the word spoken to herself; but when
she reflected that a word must also have been spoken to Mr. Greystock--
otherwise how should it have been that he never came again--that she did
not like.

In herself she regarded this passion of hers as a healthy man regards the
loss of a leg or an arm. It is a great nuisance, a loss that maims the
whole life, a misfortune to be much regretted. But because a leg is gone,
everything is not gone. A man with a wooden leg may stump about through
much action, and may enjoy the keenest pleasures of humanity. He has his
eyes left to him, and his ears, and his intellect. He will not break his
heart for the loss of that leg. And so it was with Lucy Morris. She would
still stump about and be very active. Eyes, ears, and intellect were left
to her. Looking at her position, she told herself that a happy love could
hardly have been her lot in life. Lady Fawn, she thought, was right. A
governess should make up her mind to do without a lover. She had given
away her heart, and yet she would do without a lover. When, on one dull,
dark afternoon, as she was thinking of all this, Lord Fawn suddenly put
into her hands a cruelly long printed document respecting the Sawab, she
went to work upon it immediately. As she read it, she could not refrain
from thinking how wonderfully Frank Greystock would plead the cause of the
Indian prince, if the privilege of pleading it could be given to him.

The spring had come round, with May and the London butterflies, at the
time at which our story begins, and during six months Frank Greystock had
not been at Fawn Court. Then one day Lady Eustace came down with her
ponies, and her footman, and a new dear friend of hers, Miss Macnulty.
While Miss Macnulty was being honoured by Lady Fawn, Lizzie had retreated
to a corner with her old dear friend Lucy Morris. It was pretty to see how
so wealthy and fashionable a woman as Lady Eustace could show so much
friendship to a governess. "Have you seen Frank lately?" said Lady
Eustace, referring to her cousin the barrister.

"Not for ever so long," said Lucy with her cheeriest smile.

"He is not going to prove a false knight?" asked Lady Eustace, in her
lowest whisper.

"I don't know that Mr. Greystock is much given to knighthood at all," said
Lucy, "unless it is to being made Sir Francis by his party."

"Nonsense, my dear; as if I didn't know. I suppose Lady Fawn has been
interfering, like an old cat as she is."

"She is not an old cat, Lizzie! and I won't hear her called so. If you
think so, you shouldn't come here. And she hasn't interfered. That is, she
has done nothing that she ought not to have done."

"Then she has interfered," said Lady Eustace, as she got up and walked
across the room with a sweet smile to the old cat.




CHAPTER IV

FRANK GREYSTOCK


Frank Greystock the barrister was the only son of the Dean of Bobsborough.
Now the dean had a family of daughters--not quite so numerous indeed as
that of Lady Fawn, for there were only three of them--and was by no means
a rich man. Unless a dean have a private fortune, or has chanced to draw
the happy lot of Durham in the lottery of deans, he can hardly be wealthy.
At Bobsborough, the dean was endowed with a large, rambling, picturesque,
uncomfortable house, and with £5,500 a year. In regard to personal
property, it may be asserted of all the Greystocks that they never had
any. They were a family of which the males would surely come to be deans
and admirals, and the females would certainly find husbands. And they
lived on the good things of the world, and mixed with wealthy people. But
they never had any money. The Eustaces always had money and the Bishop of
Bobsborough was wealthy. The dean was a man very different from his
brother, the admiral, who had never paid anybody anything. The dean did
pay; but he was a little slow in his payments, and money with him was
never plentiful. In these circumstances it became very expedient that
Frank Greystock should earn his bread early in life.

Nevertheless he had chosen a profession which is not often lucrative at
first. He had been called to the bar, and had gone, and was still going,
the circuit in which lies the cathedral city of Bobsborough. Bobsborough
is not much of a town, and was honoured with the judges' visits only every
other circuit. Frank began pretty well; getting some little work in
London, and perhaps nearly enough to pay the cost of the circuit out of
the county in which the cathedral was situated. But he began life after
that impecunious fashion for which the Greystocks have been noted.
Tailors, robemakers, and booksellers gave him trust, and did believe that
they would get their money. And any persistent tradesman did get it. He
did not actually hoist the black flag of impecuniosity, and proclaim his
intention of preying generally upon the retail dealers, as his uncle the
admiral had done. But he became known as a young man with whom money was
"tight." All this had been going on for three or four years before he had
met Lucy Morris at the deanery. He was then eight-and-twenty, and had been
four years called. He was thirty when old Lady Fawn hinted to him that he
had better not pay any more visits at Fawn Court.

But things had much altered with him of late. At the time of that visit to
the deanery he had made a sudden start in his profession. The corporation
of the city of London had brought an action against the Bank of England
with reference to certain alleged encroachments, of which action,
considerable as it was in all its interests, no further notice need be
taken here than is given by the statement that a great deal of money in
this cause had found its way among the lawyers. Some of it penetrated into
the pocket of Frank Greystock; but he earned more than money, better than
money, out of that affair. It was attributed to him by the attorneys that
the Bank of England was saved from the necessity of reconstructing all its
bullion cellars, and he had made his character for industry. In the year
after that, the Bobsborough people were rather driven into a corner in
search of a clever young Conservative candidate for the borough, and Frank
Greystock was invited to stand. It was not thought that there was much
chance of success, and the dean was against it. But Frank liked the honour
and glory of the contest, and so did Frank's mother. Frank Greystock
stood, and at the time in which he was warned away from Fawn Court had
been nearly a year in Parliament. "Of course it does interfere with one's
business," he had said to his father; "but then it brings one business
also. A man with a seat in Parliament who shows that he means work will
always get nearly as much work as he can do." Such was Frank's exposition
to his father. It may perhaps not be found to hold water in all cases.
Mrs. Dean was of course delighted with her son's success, and so were the
girls. Women like to feel that the young men belonging to them are doing
something in the world, so that a reflected glory may be theirs. It was
pleasant to talk of Frank as member for the City. Brothers do not always
care much for a brother's success, but a sister is generally sympathetic.
If Frank would only marry money, there was nothing he might not achieve.
That he would live to sit on the woolsack was now almost a certainty to
the dear old lady. But in order that he might sit there comfortably it was
necessary that he should at least abstain from marrying a poor wife. For
there was fear at the deanery also in regard to Lucy Morris.

"That notion, of marrying money, as you call it," Frank said to his second
sister, Margaret, "is the most disgusting idea in the world."

"It is as easy to love a girl who has something as one who has nothing,"
said Margaret.

"No, it is not; because the girls with money are scarce, and those without
it are plentiful--an argument of which I don't suppose you see the force."
Then Margaret for the moment was snubbed and retired.

"Indeed, Frank, I think Lady Fawn was right," said the mother.

"And I think she was quite wrong. If there be anything in it, it won't be
expelled by Lady Fawn's interference. Do you think I should allow Lady
Fawn to tell me not to choose such or such a woman for my wife?"

"It's the habit of seeing her, my dear. Nobody loves Lucy Morris better
than I do. We all like her. But, dear Frank, would it do for you to make
her your wife?"

Frank Greystock was silent for a moment, and then he answered his mother's
question. "I am not quite sure whether it would or would not. But I do
think this: that if I were bold enough to marry now, and to trust all to
the future, and could get Lucy to be my wife, I should be doing a great
thing. I doubt, however, whether I have the courage." All of which made
the dean's wife uneasy.

The reader who has read so far will perhaps think that Frank Greystock was
in love with Lucy as Lucy was in love with him. But such was not exactly
the case. To be in love as an absolute, well-marked, acknowledged fact is
the condition of a woman more frequently and more readily than of a man.
Such is not the common theory on the matter, as it is the man's business
to speak, and the woman's business to be reticent. And the woman is
presumed to have kept her heart free from any load of love till she may
accept the burden with an assurance that it shall become a joy and a
comfort to her. But such presumptions, though they may be very useful for
the regulation of conduct, may not always be true. It comes more within
the scope of a woman's mind than of a man's to think closely and decide
sharply on such a matter. With a man it is often chance that settles the
question for him. He resolves to propose to a woman, or proposes without
resolving, because she is close to him. Frank Greystock ridiculed the idea
of Lady Fawn's interference in so high a matter as his love--or abstinence
from love. Nevertheless, had he been made a welcome guest at Fawn Court,
he would undoubtedly have told his love to Lucy Morris. He was not a
welcome guest, but had been banished; and, as a consequence of that
banishment, he had formed no resolution in regard to Lucy, and did not
absolutely know whether she was necessary to him or not. But Lucy Morris
knew all about it.

Moreover, it frequently happens with men that they fail to analyse these
things, and do not make out for themselves any clear definition of what
their feelings are or what they mean. We hear that a man has behaved badly
to a girl, when the behaviour of which he has been guilty has resulted
simply from want of thought. He has found a certain companionship to be
agreeable to him, and he has accepted the pleasure without inquiry. Some
vague idea has floated across his brain that the world is wrong in
supposing that such friendship cannot exist without marriage or question
of marriage. It is simply friendship. And yet were his friend to tell him
that she intended to give herself in marriage elsewhere he would suffer
all the pangs of jealousy, and would imagine himself to be horribly ill-
treated. To have such a friend--a friend whom he cannot or will not make
his wife--is no injury to him. To him it is simply a delight, an
excitement in life, a thing to be known to himself only and not talked of
to others, a source of pride and inward exultation. It is a joy to think
of when he wakes, and a consolation in his little troubles. It dispels the
weariness of life, and makes a green spot of holiday within his daily
work. It is indeed death to her; but he does not know it. Frank Greystock
did think that he could not marry Lucy Morris without making an imprudent
plunge into deep water, and yet he felt that Lady Fawn was an ill-natured
old woman for hinting to him that he had better not, for the present,
continue his visits to Fawn Court. "Of course you understand me, Mr.
Greystock," she had said, meaning to be civil. "When Miss Morris has left
us--should she ever leave us--I should be most happy to see you." "What on
earth would take me to Fawn Court if Lucy were not there?" he said to
himself, not choosing to appreciate Lady Fawn's civility.

Frank Greystock was at this time nearly thirty years old. He was a good-
looking but not a strikingly handsome man, thin, of moderate height, with
sharp grey eyes; a face clean shorn, with the exception of a small
whisker; with wiry, strong dark hair, which was already beginning to show
a tinge of grey--the very opposite in appearance to his late friend, Sir
Florian Eustace. He was quick, ready-witted, self-reliant, and not
overscrupulous in the outward things of the world. He was desirous of
doing his duty to others, but he was specially desirous that others should
do their duty to him. He intended to get on in the world, and believed
that happiness was to be achieved by success. He was certainly made for
the profession which he had adopted. His father, looking to certain
morsels of Church patronage which occasionally came in his way, and to the
fact that he and the bishop were on most friendly terms, had wished his
son to take orders. But Frank had known himself and his own qualities too
well to follow his father's advice. He had chosen to be a barrister, and
now at thirty was in Parliament.

He had been asked to stand for Bobsborough in the Conservative interest,
and as a Conservative he had been returned. Those who invited him knew
probably but little of his own political beliefs or feelings--did not,
probably, know that he had any. His father was a fine old Tory of the
ancient school, who thought things were going from bad to worse, but was
able to live happily in spite of his anticipations. The dean was one of
those Old-World politicians--we meet them every day, and they are
generally very pleasant people--who enjoy the politics of the side to
which they belong without any special belief in them. If pressed hard,
they will almost own that their so-called convictions are prejudices. But
not for worlds would they be rid of them. When two or three of them meet
together, they are as free-masons, who are bound by a pleasant bond which
separates them from the outer world. They feel among themselves that
everything that is being done is bad, even though that everything is done
by their own party. It was bad to interfere with Charles, bad to endure
Cromwell, bad to banish James, bad to put up with William. The House of
Hanover was bad. All interference with prerogative has been bad. The
Reform bill was very bad. Encroachment on the estates of the bishops was
bad. Emancipation of Roman Catholics was the worst of all. Abolition of
corn-laws, church-rates, and oaths and tests were all bad. The meddling
with the Universities has been grievous. The treatment of the Irish Church
has been Satanic. The overhauling of schools is most injurious to English
education. Education bills and Irish land bills were all bad. Every step
taken has been bad. And yet to them old England is of all countries in the
world the best to live in, and is not at all the less comfortable because
of the changes that have been made. These people are ready to grumble at
every boon conferred on them, and yet to enjoy every boon. They know, too,
their privileges, and, after a fashion, understand their position. It is
picturesque, and it pleases them. To have been always in the right and yet
always on the losing side; always being ruined, always under persecution
from a wild spirit of republican-demagogism, and yet never to lose
anything, not even position or public esteem, is pleasant enough. A huge,
living, daily increasing grievance that does one no palpable harm is the
happiest possession that a man can have. There is a large body of such men
in England, and, personally, they are the very salt of the nation. He who
said that all Conservatives are stupid did not know them. Stupid
Conservatives there may be--and there certainly are very stupid Radicals.
The well-educated, widely-read Conservative, who is well assured that all
good things are gradually being brought to an end by the voice of the
people, is generally the pleasantest man to be met. But he is a Buddhist,
possessing a religious creed which is altogether dark and mysterious to
the outer world. Those who watch the ways of the advanced Buddhist hardly
know whether the man does believe himself in his hidden god, but men
perceive that he is respectable, self-satisfied, and a man of note. It is
of course from the society of such that Conservative candidates are to be
sought; but, alas, it is hard to indoctrinate young minds with the old
belief since new theories of life have become so rife!

Nevertheless Frank Greystock, when he was invited to stand for Bobsborough
in the Conservative interest, had not for a moment allowed any political
heterodoxy on his own part to stand in the way of his advancement. It may,
perhaps, be the case that a barrister is less likely to be influenced by
personal convictions in taking his side in politics than any other man who
devotes himself to public affairs. No slur on the profession is intended
by this suggestion. A busy, clever, useful man, who has been at work all
his life, finds that his own progress towards success demands from him
that he shall become a politician. The highest work of a lawyer can be
reached only through political struggle. As a large-minded man of the
world, peculiarly conversant with the fact that every question has two
sides, and that as much may often be said on one side as on the other, he
has probably not become violent in his feelings as a political partisan.
Thus he sees that there is an opening here or an opening there, and the
offence in either case is not great to him. With Frank Greystock the
matter was very easy. There certainly was no apostasy. He had now and
again attacked his father's ultra Toryism, and rebuked his mother and
sisters when they spoke of Gladstone as Apollyon, and called John Bright
the Abomination of Desolation. But it was easy for him to fancy himself a
Conservative, and as such he took his seat in the House without any
feeling of discomfort.

During the first four months of his first session he had not spoken, but
he had made himself useful. He had sat on one or two committees, though as
a barrister he might have excused himself, and had done his best to learn
the forms of the House. But he had already begun to find that the time
which he devoted to Parliament was much wanted for his profession. Money
was very necessary to him. Then a new idea was presented to him.

John Eustace and Greystock were very intimate, as also had been Sir
Florian and Greystock. "I tell you what I wish you'd do, Greystock,"
Eustace said to him one day, as they were standing idle together in the
lobby of the House. For John Eustace was also in Parliament.

"Anything to oblige you, my friend."

"It's only a trifle," said Eustace. "Just to marry your cousin, my
brother's widow."

"By Jove, I wish I had the chance!"

"I don't see why you shouldn't. She is sure to marry somebody, and at her
age so she ought. She's not twenty-three yet. We could trust you--with the
child and all the rest of it. As it is, she is giving us a deal of
trouble."

"But, my dear fellow--"

"I know she's fond of you. You were dining there last Sunday."

"And so was Fawn. Lord Fawn is the man to marry Lizzie. You see if he
doesn't. He was uncommonly sweet on her the other night, and really
interested her about the Sawab."

"She'll never be Lady Fawn," said John Eustace. "And to tell the truth, I
shouldn't care to have to deal with Lord Fawn. He would be infinitely
troublesome; and I can hardly wash my hands of her affairs. She's worth
nearly £5,000 a year as long as she lives, and I really don't think that
she's much amiss."

"Much amiss! I don't know whether she's not the prettiest woman I ever
saw," said Greystock.

"Yes; but I mean in conduct, and all that. She is making herself queer;
and Camperdown, our lawyer, means to jump upon her; but it's only because
she doesn't know what she ought to be at, and what she ought not. You
could tell her."

"It wouldn't suit me at all to have to quarrel with Camperdown," said the
barrister, laughing.

"You and he would settle everything in five minutes, and it would save me
a world of trouble," said Eustace.

"Fawn is your man; take my word for it," said Greystock, as he walked back
into the House.

       *       *       *       *       *

Dramatists, when they write their plays, have a delightful privilege of
prefixing a list of their personages; and the dramatists of old used to
tell us who was in love with whom, and what were the blood relationships
of all the persons. In such a narrative as this, any proceeding of that
kind would be unusual, and therefore the poor narrator has been driven to
expend his four first chapters in the mere task of introducing his
characters. He regrets the length of these introductions, and will now
begin at once the action of his story.




CHAPTER V

THE EUSTACE NECKLACE


John Eustace, Lady Eustace's brother-in-law, had told his friend
Greystock, the lady's cousin, that Mr. Camperdown the lawyer intended to
"jump upon" that lady. Making such allowance and deduction from the force
of these words as the slang expression requires, we may say that John
Eustace was right. Mr. Camperdown was in earnest, and did intend to obtain
the restoration of those jewels. Mr. Camperdown was a gentleman of about
sixty, who had been lawyer to Sir Florian's father, and whose father had
been lawyer to Sir Florian's grandfather. His connection with the property
and with the family was of a nature to allow him to take almost any
liberty with the Eustaces. When therefore John Eustace, in regard to those
diamonds, had pleaded that the heir in his long minority would obtain
ample means of buying more diamonds, and of suggesting that the plunder
for the sake of tranquillity should be allowed, Mr. Camperdown took upon
himself to say that he'd "be ---- if he'd put up with it."

"I really don't know what you are to do," said John Eustace.

"I'll file a bill in Chancery, if it's necessary," said the old lawyer.
"Heaven on earth! as trustee how are you to reconcile yourself to such a
robbery? They represent £500 a year forever, and she is to have them
simply because she chooses to take them!"

"I suppose Florian could have given them away. At any rate, he could have
sold them."

"I don't know that," said Mr. Camperdown. "I have not looked as yet, but I
think that this necklace has been made an heirloom. At any rate, it
represents an amount of property that shouldn't and couldn't be made over
legally without some visible evidence of transfer. It's as clear a case of
stealing as I ever knew in my life, and as bad a case. She hadn't a
farthing, and she has got the whole of the Ayrshire property for her life.
She goes about and tells everybody that it's hers to sell to-morrow if she
pleases to sell it. No, John"--Mr. Camperdown had known Eustace when he
was a boy, and had watched him become a man, and hadn't yet learned to
drop the name by which he had called the boy--"we mustn't allow it. What
do you think of her applying to me for an income to support her child, a
baby not yet two years old?" Mr. Camperdown had been very adverse to all
the circumstances of Sir Florian's marriage, and had subjected himself to
Sir Florian's displeasure for expressing his opinion. He had tried to
explain that as the lady brought no money into the family she was not
entitled to such a jointure as Sir Florian was determined to lavish upon
her. But Sir Florian had been obstinate, both in regard to the settlement
and the will. It was not till after Sir Florian's death that this terrible
master of the jewels had even suggested itself to Mr. Camperdown. The
jewellers in whose custody the things had been since the death of the late
Lady Eustace had mentioned the affair to him immediately on the young
widow's return from Naples. Sir Florian had withdrawn, not all the jewels,
but by far the most valuable of them, from the jewellers' care on his
return to London from their marriage tour to Scotland, and this was the
result. The jewellers were at that time without any doubt as to the date
at which the necklace was taken from them.

Mr. Camperdown's first attempt was made by a most courteous and even
complimentary note, in which he suggested to Lady Eustace that it would be
for the advantage of all parties that the family jewels should be kept
together. Lizzie, as she read this note, smiled, and said to herself that
she did not exactly see how her own interests would be best served by such
an arrangement. She made no answer to Mr. Camperdown's note. Some months
after this, when the heir was born, and as Lady Eustace was passing
through London on her journey from Bobsborough to Portray, a meeting had
been arranged between her and Mr. Camperdown. She had endeavoured by all
the wiles she knew to avoid this meeting, but it had been forced upon her.
She had been almost given to understand that unless she submitted to it,
she would not be able to draw her income from the Portray property.
Messrs. Mowbray & Mopus had advised her to submit. "My husband gave me a
necklace, and they want me to give it back," she had said to Mr. Mopus.
"Do nothing of the kind," Mr. Mopus had replied. "If you find it
necessary, refer Mr. Camperdown to us. We will answer him." The interview
had taken place, during which Mr. Camperdown took the trouble to explain
very plainly and more than once that the income from the Portray property
belonged to Lady Eustace for her life only. It would after her death be
rejoined, of necessity, to the rest of the Eustace property. This was
repeated to Lady Eustace in the presence of John Eustace; but she made no
remark on being so informed. "You understand the nature of the settlement,
Lady Eustace?" Mr. Camperdown had said. "I believe I understand
everything," she replied. Then, just at the close of the interview, he
asked a question about the jewels. Lady Eustace at first made no reply.
"They might as well be sent back to Messrs. Garnett," said Mr. Camperdown.
"I don't know that I have any to send back," she answered; and then she
escaped before Mr. Camperdown was able to arrange any further attack. "I
can manage with her better by letter than I can personally," he said to
John Eustace.

Lawyers such as Mr. Camperdown are slow, and it was three or four months
after that when he wrote a letter in his own name to Lady Eustace,
explaining to her, still courteously, that it was his business to see that
the property of the Eustace family was placed in fit hands, and that a
certain valuable necklace of diamonds, which was an heirloom of the
family, and which was undeniably the property of the heir, was believed to
be in her custody. As such property was peculiarly subject to risks, would
she have the kindness to make arrangements for handing over the necklace
to the custody of the Messrs. Garnett? To this letter Lizzie made no
answer whatever, nor did she to a second note, calling attention to the
first. When John Eustace told Greystock that. Camperdown intended to "jump
upon" Lady Eustace, the following further letter had been written by the
firm, but up to that time Lizzie had not replied to it:

"62 NEW SQUARE, LINCOLN'S INN,

"5 MAY, 186-.

"MADAM: It is our duty as attorneys acting on behalf of the estate of your
late husband, Sir Florian Eustace, and in the interest of your son, his
heir, to ask for restitution of a certain valuable diamond necklace which
is believed to be now in the possession of your ladyship. Our senior
partner, Mr. Camperdown, has written to your ladyship more than once on
the subject, but has not been honoured with any reply. Doubtless had there
been any mistake as to the necklace being in your hands we would have been
so informed. The diamonds were withdrawn from Messrs. Garnett, the
jewellers, by Sir Florian soon after his marriage, and were, no doubt,
intrusted to your keeping. They are appanages of the family which should
not be in your hands as the widow of the late baronet, and they constitute
an amount of property which certainly cannot be alienated from the family
without inquiry or right, as might any trifling article either of use or
ornament. The jewels are valued at over £10,000.

"We are reluctantly compelled, by the fact of your having left unanswered
three letters from Mr. Camperdown, Senior, on the subject, to explain to
you that if attention be not paid to this letter, we shall be obliged, in
the performance of our duty, to take legal steps for the restitution of
the property.

"We have the honour to be, Madam,

"Your ladyship's most obedient servants,

"CAMPERDOWN & SON.

"To LADY EUSTACE," etc., etc.

A few days after it was sent, old Mr. Camperdown got the letter-book of
the office and read the letter to John Eustace.

"I don't see how you're to get them," said Eustace.

"We'll throw upon her the burden of showing that they have become legally
her property. She can't do it."

"Suppose she sold them?"

"We'll follow them up. Ten thousand pounds, my dear John! God bless my
soul! it's a magnificent dowry for a daughter--an ample provision for a
younger son. And she is to be allowed to filch it, as other widows filch
china cups and a silver teaspoon or two! It's quite a common thing, but I
never heard of such a haul as this."

"It will be very unpleasant," said Eustace.

"And then she still goes about everywhere declaring that the Portray
property is her own. She's a bad lot. I knew it from the first. Of course
we shall have trouble." Then Mr. Eustace explained to the lawyer that
their best way out of it all would be to get the widow married to some
respectable husband. She was sure to marry sooner or later, so John
Eustace said, and any "decently decent" fellow would be easier to deal
with than she herself. "He must be very indecently indecent if he is not,"
said Mr. Camperdown. But Mr. Eustace did not name Frank Graystock the
barrister as the probable future decent husband.

When Lizzie first got the letter, which she did on the day after the visit
at Fawn Court of which mention has been made, she put it by unread for a
couple of days. She opened it, not knowing the clerk's handwriting, but
read only the first line and the signature. For two days she went on with
the ordinary affairs and amusements of her life, as though no such letter
had reached her; but was thinking of it all the time. The diamonds were in
her possession, and she had had them valued by her old friend Mr. Benjamin
of the firm of Harter & Benjamin. Mr. Benjamin had suggested that stones
of such a value should not be left to the risk of an ordinary London
house; but Lizzie had felt that if Mr. Benjamin got them into his hands,
Mr. Benjamin might perhaps not return them. Messrs. Camperdown and Garnett
between them might form a league with Mr. Benjamin. Where would she be,
should Mr. Benjamin tell her that under some legal sanction he had given
the jewels up to Mr. Camperdown? She hinted to Mr. Benjamin that she would
perhaps sell them if she got a good offer. Mr. Benjamin, who was very
familiar with her, hinted that there might be a little family difficulty.
"Oh, none in the least," said Lizzie; "but I don't think I shall part with
them." Then she gave Mr. Benjamin an order for a strong box, which was
supplied to her. The strong box, which was so heavy that she could barely
lift it herself, was now in her London bedroom.

On the morning of the third day she read the letter. Miss Macnulty was
staying with her, but she had not said a word to Miss Macnulty about the
letter. She read it up in her own bedroom and then sat down to think about
it. Sir Florian, as he had handed to her the stones for the purpose of a
special dinner party which had been given to them when passing through
London, had told her that they were family jewels. "That setting was done
for my mother," he said, "but it is already old. When we are at home again
they shall be reset." Then he had added some little husband's joke as to a
future daughter-in-law who should wear them. Nevertheless she was not sure
whether the fact of their being so handed to her did not make them her
own. She had spoken a second time to Mr. Mopus, and Mr. Mopus had asked
her whether there existed any family deed as to the diamonds. She had
heard of no such deed, nor did Mr. Camperdown mention such a deed. After
reading the letter once she read it a dozen times; and then, like a woman,
made up her mind that her safest course would be not to answer it.

But yet she felt sure that something unpleasant would come of it. Mr.
Camperdown was not a man to take up such a question and let it drop. Legal
steps! What did legal steps mean, and what could they do to her? Would Mr.
Camperdown be able to put her in prison, or to take away from her the
estate of Portray? She could swear that her husband had given them to her,
and could invent any form of words she pleased as accompanying the gift.
No one else had been near them then. But she was, and felt herself to be
absolutely, alarmingly ignorant, not only of the laws but of custom in
such matters. Messrs. Mowbray & Mopus and Mr. Benjamin were the allies to
whom she looked for guidance; but she was wise enough to know that Mowbray
& Mopus and Harter & Benjamin were not trustworthy, whereas Camperdown &
Son and the Messrs. Garnett were all as firm as rocks and as respectable
as the Bank of England. Circumstances--unfortunate circumstances--drove
her to Harter & Benjamin and to Mowbray & Mopus, while she would have
taken so much delight in feeling the strong honesty of the other people to
be on her side! She would have talked to her friends about Mr. Camperdown
and the people at Garnetts' with so much satisfaction! But ease, security,
and even respectability may be bought too dearly. Ten thousand pounds! Was
she prepared to surrender such a sum as that? She had, indeed, already
realized the fact that it might be very difficult to touch the money. When
she had suggested to Mr. Benjamin that he should buy the jewels, that
worthy tradesman had by no means jumped at the offer. Of what use to her
would be a necklace always locked up in an iron box, which box, for aught
she knew, myrmidons from Mr. Camperdown might carry off during her absence
from the house? Would it not be better to come to terms and surrender? But
then what should the terms be?

If only there had been a friend whom she could consult--a friend whom she
could consult on a really friendly footing!--not a simply respectable,
off-handed, high-minded friend, who would advise her as a matter of course
to make restitution. Her uncle the dean, or her cousin Frank, or old Lady
Fawn, would be sure to give her such advice as that. There are people who
are so very high-minded when they have to deal with the interests of their
friends! What if she were to ask Lord Fawn?

Thoughts of a second marriage had, of course, crossed Lady Eustace's mind,
and they were by no means the worst thoughts that found a place there. She
had a grand idea--this selfish, hard-fisted little woman, who could not
bring herself to abandon the plunder on which she had laid her hand--a
grand idea of surrendering herself and all her possessions to a great
passion. For Florian Eustace she had never cared. She had sat down by his
side, and looked into his handsome face, and read poetry to him, because
of his wealth, and because it had been indispensable to her to settle
herself well. And he had been all very well--a generous, open-hearted,
chivalrous, irascible, but rather heavy-minded gentleman; but she had
never been in love with him. Now she desired to be so in love that she
could surrender everything to her love. There was as yet nothing of such
love in her bosom. She had seen no one who had so touched her. But she was
alive to the romance of the thing, and was in love with the idea of being
in love. "Ah," she would say to herself in her moments of solitude, "if I
had a Corsair of my own, how I would sit on watch for my lover's boat by
the sea-shore!" And she believed it of herself that she could do so.

But it would also be very nice to be a peeress--so that she might, without
any doubt, be one of the great ladies of London. As a baronet's widow with
a large income, she was already almost a great lady; but she was quite
alive to a suspicion that she was not altogether strong in her position.
The bishop's people and the dean's people did not quite trust her. The
Camperdowns and Garnetts utterly distrusted her. The Mopuses and Benjamins
were more familiar than they would be with a really great lady. She was
sharp enough to understand all this. Should it be Lord Fawn or should it
be a Corsair? The worst of Lord Fawn was the undoubted fact that he was
not himself a great man. He could, no doubt, make his wife a peeress; but
he was poor, encumbered with a host of sisters, dull as a blue-book, and
possessed of little beyond his peerage to recommend him. If she could only
find a peer, unmarried, with a dash of the Corsair about him! In the
meantime what was she to do about the jewels?

There was staying with her at this time a certain Miss Macnulty, who was
related, after some distant fashion, to old Lady Linlithgow, and who was
as utterly destitute of possessions or means of existence as any
unfortunate, well-born, and moderately-educated middle-aged woman in
London. To live upon her friends, such as they might be, was the only mode
of life within her reach. It was not that she had chosen such dependence;
nor, indeed, had she endeavoured to reject it. It had come to her as a
matter of course--either that or the poor-house. As to earning her bread,
except by that attendance which a poor friend gives, the idea of any
possibility that way had never entered her head. She could do nothing--
except dress like a lady with the smallest possible cost, and endeavour to
be obliging. Now, at this moment, her condition was terribly precarious.
She had quarrelled with Lady Linlithgow, and had been taken in by her old
friend Lizzie--her old enemy might, perhaps, be a truer expression--
because of that quarrel. But a permanent home had not even been promised
to her; and poor Miss Macnulty was aware that even a permanent home with
Lady Eustace would not be an unmixed blessing. In her way, Miss Macnulty
was an honest woman.

They were sitting together one May afternoon in the little back drawing-
room in Mount Street. They had dined early, were now drinking tea, and
intended to go to the opera. It was six o'clock, and was still broad day,
but the thick coloured blind was kept across the single window, and the
folding doors of the room were nearly closed, and there was a feeling of
evening in the room. The necklace during the whole day had been so heavy
on Lizzie's heart that she had been unable to apply her thoughts to the
building of that castle in the air in which the Corsair was to reign
supreme, but not alone. "My dear," she said--she generally called Miss
Macnulty my dear--"you know that box I had made by the jewellers."

"You mean the safe."

"Well--yes; only it isn't a safe. A safe is a great big thing. I had it
made especially for the diamonds Sir Florian gave me."

"I supposed it was so."

"I wonder whether there's any danger about it?"

"If I were you, Lady Eustace, I wouldn't keep them in the house. I should
have them kept where Sir Florian kept them. Suppose anybody should come
and murder you."

"I'm not a bit afraid of that," said Lizzie.

"I should be. And what will you do with it when you go to Scotland?"

"I took them with me before--in my own care. I know that wasn't safe. I
wish I knew what to do with them."

"There are people who keep such things," said Miss Macnulty.

Then Lizzie paused a moment. She was dying for counsel and for confidence.
"I cannot trust them anywhere," she said. "It is just possible there may
be a lawsuit about them."

"How a lawsuit?"

"I cannot explain it all, but I am very unhappy about it. They want me to
give them up; but my husband gave them to me, and for his sake I will not
do so. When he threw them around my neck he told me that they were my own
--so he did. How can a woman give up such a present--from a husband--who
is dead? As to the value, I care nothing. But I won't do it." By this time
Lady Eustace was in tears, and had so far succeeded as to have produced
some amount of belief in Miss Macnulty's mind.

"If they are your own, they can't take them from you," said Miss Macnulty.

"They shan't. They shall find that I've got some spirit left." Then she
reflected that a real Corsair lover would protect her jewels for her--
would guard them against a score of Camperdowns. But she doubted whether
Lord Fawn would do much in that way. Then the door was opened, and Lord
Fawn was announced. It was not at all unusual with Lord Fawn to call on
the widow at this hour. Mount Street is not exactly in the way from the
India Office to the House of Lords; but a hansom cab can make it almost in
the way. Of neglect of official duty Lord Fawn was never guilty; but a
half hour for private business or for relaxation between one stage of duty
and another--can any Minister grudge so much to an indefatigable follower?
Lady Eustace had been in tears as he was announced, but the light of the
room was so low that the traces of them could hardly be seen. She was in
her Corsair state of mind, divided between her jewels and her poetry, and
caring not very much for the increased rank which Lord Fawn could give
her. "The Sawab's case is coming on in the House of Commons this very
night," he said, in answer to a question from Miss Macnulty. Then he
turned to Lady Eustace. "Your cousin, Mr. Greystock, is going to ask a
question in the House."

"Shall you be there to answer him?" asked Miss Macnulty innocently.

"Oh dear, no. But I shall be present. A peer can go, you know." Then Lord
Fawn, at considerable length, explained to the two ladies the nature and
condition of the British Parliament. Miss Macnulty experienced an innocent
pleasure in having such things told to her by a lord. Lady Eustace knew
that this was the way in which Lord Fawn made love, and thought that from
him it was as good as any other way. If she were to marry a second time
simply with a view of being a peeress, of having a respected husband, and
making good her footing in the world, she would as lief listen to
parliamentary details and the prospects of the Sawab as to any other
matters. She knew very well that no Corsair propensities would be
forthcoming from Lord Fawn. Lord Fawn had just worked himself round to the
Sawab again, when Frank Greystock entered the room. "Now we have both the
Houses represented," said Lady Eustace, as she welcomed her cousin.

"You intend to ask your question about the Sawab tonight?" asked Lord Fawn
with intense interest, feeling that had it been his lot to perform that
task before he went to his couch, he would at this moment have been
preparing his little speech.

But Frank Greystock had not come to his cousin's house to talk of the
Prince of the Mygawb territory. When his friend Eustace had suggested to
him that he should marry the widow, he had ridiculed the idea. But
nevertheless he had thought of it a good deal. He was struggling hard,
working diligently, making for himself a character in Parliament,
succeeding--so said all his friends--as a barrister. He was a rising young
man, one of those whose names began to be much in the mouths of other men;
but still he was poor. It seemed to himself that among other good gifts
that of economy had not been bestowed upon him. He owed a little money,
and though he owed it, he went on spending his earnings. He wanted just
such a lift in the world as a wife with an income would give him. As for
looking about for a girl whom he could honestly love, and who should have
a fortune of her own, as well as beauty, birth, and all the other things--
that was out of his reach. If he talked to himself of love, if he were
ever to acknowledge to himself that love was to have sway over him, then
must Lucy Morris be the mistress of his heart. He had come to know enough
about himself to be aware of that; but he knew also that he had said
nothing binding him to walk in that path. It was quite open to him to
indulge a discreet ambition without dishonour. Therefore he also had come
to call upon the beautiful widow. The courtship with her he knew need not
be long. He could ask her to marry him to-morrow--as for that matter,
to-day--without a feeling of hesitation. She might accept him, or might
reject him; but, as he said to himself, in neither case would any harm be
done.

An idea of the same kind flitted across Lizzie's mind as she sat and
talked to the two gentlemen. She knew that her cousin Frank was poor, but
she thought that she could fall in love with him. He was not exactly a
Corsair, but he was a man who had certain Corsair propensities. He was
bold and dashing, unscrupulous and clever--a man to make a name for
himself, and one to whom a woman could endure to be obedient. There could
be no question as to choice between him and Lord Fawn if she were to allow
herself to choose by liking. And she thought that Frank Greystock would
keep the necklace, if he himself were made to have an interest in the
necklace; whereas Lord Fawn would undoubtedly surrender it at once to Mr.
Camperdown.

Lord Fawn had some slight idea of waiting to see the cousin go; but as
Greystock had a similar idea, and as he was the stronger of the two, of
course Lord Fawn went. He perhaps remembered that the hansom cab was at
the door, costing sixpence every fifteen minutes, and that he wished to
show himself in the House of Lords before the peers rose. Miss Macnulty
also left the room, and Frank was alone with the widow.

"Lizzie," said he, "you must be very solitary here."

"I am solitary."

"And hardly happy."

"Anything but happy, Frank. I have things that make me very unhappy; one
thing that I will tell you if you will let me."

Frank had almost made up his mind to ask her on the spot to give him
permission to console all her sorrows when there came a clattering double
knock at the door.

"They know I shall be at home to nobody else now," said Lady Eustace.

But Frank Greystock had hardly regained his self-possession when Miss
Macnulty hurried into the room, and, with a look almost of horror,
declared that Lady Linlithgow was in the parlour.




CHAPTER VI

LADY LINLITHGOW'S MISSION


"Lady Linlithgow," said Frank Greystock, holding up both his hands.

"Yes, indeed," said Miss Macnulty. "I did not speak to her, but I saw her.
She has sent her ---- love to Lady Eustace, and begs that she will see
her."

Lady Eustace had been so surprised by the announcement that hitherto she
had not spoken a word. The quarrel between her and her aunt had been of
such a nature that it had seemed to be impossible that the old countess
should come to Mount Street. Lizzie had certainly behaved very badly to
her aunt--about as badly as a young woman could behave to an old woman.
She had accepted bread, and shelter, and the very clothes on her back from
her aunt's bounty, and had rejected even the hand of her benefactress the
first moment that she had bread, and shelter, and clothes of her own. And
here was Lady Linlithgow down-stairs in the parlour, and sending up her
love to her niece! "I won't see her," said Lizzie.

"You had better see her," said Frank.

"I can't see her," said Lizzie. "Good gracious, my dear, what has she come
for?"

"She says it's very important," said Miss Macnulty.

"Of course you must see her," said Frank. "Let me get out of the house,
and then tell the servant to show her up at once. Don't be weak now,
Lizzie, and I'll come and find out all about it to-morrow."

"Mind you do," said Lizzie. Then Frank took his departure, and Lizzie did
as she was bidden. "You remain in here, Julia," she said, "so as to be
near if I want you. She shall come into the front room." Then, absolutely
shaking with fear of the approaching evil, she took her seat in the
largest drawing-room. There was still a little delay. Time was given to
Frank Greystock to get away, and to do so without meeting Lady Linlithgow
in the passage. The message was conveyed by Miss Macnulty to the servant,
and the same servant opened the front door for Frank before he delivered
it. Lady Linlithgow, too, though very strong, was old. She was slow, or
perhaps it might more properly be said she was stately in her movements.
She was one of those old women who are undoubtedly old women--who in the
remembrance of younger people seem always to have been old women--but on
whom old age appears to have no debilitating effects. If the hand of Lady
Linlithgow ever trembled, it trembled from anger. If her foot ever
faltered, it faltered for effect. In her way Lady Linlithgow was a very
powerful human being. She knew nothing of fear, nothing of charity,
nothing of mercy, and nothing of the softness of love. She had no
imagination. She was worldly, covetous, and not unfrequently cruel. But
she meant to be true and honest, though she often failed in her meaning,
and she had an idea of her duty in life. She was not self-indulgent. She
was as hard as an oak post, but then she was also as trustworthy. No human
being liked her; but she had the good word of a great many human beings.
At great cost to her own comfort, she had endeavoured to do her duty to
her niece, Lizzie Greystock, when Lizzie was homeless. Undoubtedly
Lizzie's bed, while it had been spread under her aunt's roof, had not been
one of roses; but such as it had been, she had endured to occupy it while
it served her needs. She had constrained herself to bear her aunt; but
from the moment of her escape she had chosen to reject her aunt
altogether. Now her aunt's heavy step was heard upon the stairs! Lizzie
also was a brave woman after a certain fashion. She could dare to incur a
great danger for an adequate object. But she was too young as yet to have
become mistress of that persistent courage which was Lady Linlithgow's
peculiar possession.

When the countess entered the drawing-room Lizzie rose upon her legs, but
did not come forward from her chair. The old woman was not tall; but her
face was long, and at the same time large, square at the chin and square
at the forehead, and gave her almost an appearance of height. Her nose was
very prominent, not beaked, but straight and strong, and broad at the
bridge, and of a dark-red colour. Her eyes were sharp and grey. Her mouth
was large, and over it there was almost beard enough for a young man's
moustache. Her chin was firm, and large, and solid. Her hair was still
brown, and was only just grizzled in parts. Nothing becomes an old woman
like gray hair, but Lady Linlithgow's hair would never be gray. Her
appearance, on the whole, was not prepossessing, but it gave one an idea
of honest, real strength. What one saw was not buckram, whalebone, paint,
and false hair. It was all human--hardly feminine, certainly not angelic,
with perhaps a hint in the other direction--but a human body, and not a
thing of pads and patches. Lizzie, as she saw her aunt, made up her mind
for the combat. Who is there that has lived to be a man or woman, and has
not experienced a moment in which a combat has impended, and a call for
such sudden courage has been necessary? Alas! sometimes the combat comes,
and the courage is not there. Lady Eustace was not at her ease as she saw
her aunt enter the room. "Oh, come ye in peace, or come ye in war?" she
would have said had she dared. Her aunt had sent up her love, if the
message had been delivered aright; but what of love could there be between
those two? The countess dashed at once to the matter in hand, making no
allusion to Lizzie's ungrateful conduct to herself. "Lizzie," she said,
"I've been asked to come to you by Mr. Camperdown. I'll sit down, if you
please."

"Oh, certainly, Aunt Penelope. Mr. Camperdown!"

"Yes; Mr. Camperdown. You know who he is. He has been to me because I am
your nearest relation. So I am, and therefore I have come. I don't like
it, I can tell you."

"As for that, Aunt Penelope, you've done it to please yourself," said
Lizzie in a tone of insolence with which Lady Linlithgow had been familiar
in former days.

"No, I haven't, Miss. I haven't come for my own pleasure at all. I have
come for the credit of the family, if any good can be done towards saving
it. You've got your husband's diamonds locked up somewhere, and you must
give them back."

"My husband's diamonds were my diamonds," said Lizzie stoutly.

"They were family diamonds, Eustace diamonds, heirlooms--old property
belonging to the Eustaces, just like their estates. Sir Florian didn't
give 'em away, and couldn't, and wouldn't if he could. Such things ain't
given away in that fashion. It's all nonsense, and you must give them up."

"Who says so?"

"I say so."

"That's nothing, Aunt Penelope."

"Nothing, is it? You'll see. Mr. Camperdown says so. All the world will
say so. If you don't take care, you'll find yourself brought into a court
of law, my dear, and a jury will say so. That's what it will come to. What
good will they do you? You can't sell them; and, as a widow, you can't
wear 'em. If you marry again, you wouldn't disgrace your husband by going
about showing off the Eustace diamonds. But you don't know anything about
'proper feelings.'"

"I know every bit as much as you do, Aunt Penelope, and I don't want you
to teach me."

"Will you give up the jewels to Mr. Camperdown?"

"No, I won't."

"Or to the jewellers?"

"No, I won't. I mean to--keep them--for--my child." Then there came forth
a sob and a tear, and Lizzie's handkerchief was held to her eyes.

"Your child! Wouldn't they be kept properly for him, and for the family,
if the jewellers had them? I don't believe you care about your child."

"Aunt Penelope, you had better take care."

"I shall say just what I think, Lizzie. You can't frighten me. The fact
is, you are disgracing the family you have married into, and as you are my
niece----"

"I'm not disgracing anybody. You are disgracing everybody."

"As you are my niece, I have undertaken to come to you and to tell you
that if you don't give 'em up within a week from this time they'll proceed
against you for--stealing 'em." Lady Linlithgow, as she uttered this
terrible threat, bobbed her head at her niece in a manner calculated to
add very much to the force of her words. The words, and tone, and gesture
combined were, in truth, awful.

"I didn't steal them. My husband gave them to me with his own hands."

"You wouldn't answer Mr. Camperdown's letters, you know. That alone will
condemn you. After that there isn't a word to be said about it--not a
word. Mr. Camperdown is the family lawyer, and when he writes to you
letter after letter you take no more notice of him than a--dog." The old
woman was certainly very powerful. The way in which she pronounced that
last word did make Lady Eustace ashamed of herself. "Why didn't you answer
his letters, unless you knew you were in the wrong? Of course you knew you
were in the wrong."

"No, I didn't. A woman isn't obliged to answer everything that is written
to her."

"Very well! You just say that before the Judge! for you'll have to go
before a judge. I tell you, Lizzie Greystock, or Eustace, or whatever your
name is, it's downright picking and stealing. I suppose you want to sell
them."

"I won't stand this, Aunt Penelope," said Lizzie, rising from her seat.

"You must stand it, and you'll have to stand worse than that. You don't
suppose Mr. Camperdown got me to come here for nothing. If you don't want
to be made out to be a thief before all the world----"

"I won't stand it," shrieked Lizzie. "You have no business to come here
and say such things to me. It's my house."

"I shall say just what I please."

"Miss Macnulty, come in." And Lizzie threw open the door, hardly knowing
how the very weak ally whom she now invoked could help her, but driven by
the stress of the combat to seek assistance somewhere. Miss Macnulty, who
was seated near the door, and who had necessarily heard every word of the
conversation, had no alternative but to appear. Of all human beings Lady
Linlithgow was to her the most terrible, and yet, after a fashion, she
loved the old woman. Miss Macnulty was humble, cowardly, and subservient;
but she was not a fool, and she understood the difference between truth
and falsehood.

She had endured fearful things from Lady Linlithgow; but she knew that
there might be more of sound protection in Lady Linlithgow's real wrath
than in Lizzie's pretended affection,

"So you are there, are you?" said the countess.

"Yes, I am here, Lady Linlithgow."

"Listening, I suppose. Well, so much the better. You know well enough, and
you can tell her. You ain't a fool, though I suppose you'll be afraid to
open your mouth."

"Julia," said Lady Eustace, "will you have the kindness to see that my
aunt is shown to her carriage? I cannot stand her violence, and I will go
up-stairs." So saying she made her way very gracefully into the back
drawing-room, whence she could escape to her bedroom.

But her aunt fired a last shot at her. "Unless you do as you're bid,
Lizzie, you'll find yourself in prison as sure as eggs." Then, when her
niece was beyond hearing, she turned to Miss Macnulty. "I suppose you've
heard about these diamonds, Macnulty?"

"I know she's got them, Lady Linlithgow."

"She has no more right to them than you have. I suppose you're afraid to
tell her so, lest she should turn you out; but it's well she should know
it. I've done my duty. Never mind about the servant. I'll find my way out
of the house." Nevertheless the bell was rung, and the countess was shown
to her carriage with proper consideration.

The two ladies went to the opera, and it was not till after their return,
and just as they were going to bed, that anything further was said about
either the necklace or the visit. Miss Macnulty would not begin the
subject, and Lizzie purposely postponed it. But not for a moment had it
been off Lady Eustace's mind. She did not care much for music, though she
professed to do so, and thought that she did. But on this night, had she
at other times been a slave to Saint Cecilia, she would have been free
from that thraldom. The old woman's threats had gone into her very heart's
blood. Theft, and prison, and juries, and judges had been thrown at her
head so violently that she was almost stunned. Could it really be the case
that they would prosecute her for stealing? She was Lady Eustace, and who
but Lady Eustace should have those diamonds or be allowed to wear them?
Nobody could say that Sir Florian had not given them to her. It could not,
surely, be brought against her as an actual crime that she had not
answered Mr. Camperdown's letters? And yet she was not sure. Her ideas
about law and judicial proceedings were very vague. Of what was wrong and
what was right she had a distinct notion. She knew well enough that she
was endeavouring to steal the Eustace diamonds; but she did not in the
least know what power there might be in the law to prevent or to punish
her for the intended theft. She knew well that the thing was not really
her own; but there were, as she thought, so many points in her favour,
that she felt it to be a cruelty that any one should grudge her the
plunder. Was not she the only Lady Eustace living? As to these threats
from Mr. Camperdown and Lady Linlithgow, she felt certain they would be
used against her whether they were true or false. She would break her
heart should she abandon her prey and afterwards find that Mr. Camperdown
would have been wholly powerless against her had she held on to it. But
then who would tell her the truth? She was sharp enough to understand, or
at any rate suspicious enough to believe, that Mr. Mopus would be actuated
by no other desire in the matter than that of running up a bill against
her. "My dear," she said to Miss Macnulty, as they went upstairs after the
opera, "come into my room a moment. You heard all that my aunt said."

"I could not help hearing. You told me to stay there, and the door was
ajar."

"I wanted you to hear. Of course what she said was the greatest nonsense
in the world."

"I don't know."

"When she talked about my being taken to prison for not answering a
lawyer's letter, that must be nonsense."

"I suppose that was."

"And then she is such a ferocious old termagant--such an old vulturess.
Now isn't she a ferocious old termagant?" Lizzie paused for an answer,
desirous that her companion should join her in her enmity against her
aunt; but Miss Macnulty was unwilling to say anything against one who had
been her protectress, and might, perhaps, be her protectress again. "You
don't mean to say you don't hate her?" said Lizzie. "If you didn't hate
her after all she has done to you, I should despise you. Don't you hate
her?"

"I think she's a very upsetting old woman," said Miss Macnulty.

"Oh, you poor creature! Is that all you dare say about her?"

"I'm obliged to be a poor creature," said Miss Macnulty, with a red spot
on each of her cheeks.

Lady Eustace understood this, and relented. "But you needn't be afraid,"
she said, "to tell me what you think."

"About the diamonds, you mean."

"Yes, about the diamonds."

"You have enough without them. I'd give 'em up for peace and quiet." That
was Miss Macnulty's advice.

"No, I haven't enough, or nearly enough. I've had to buy ever so many
things since my husband died. They've done all they could to be hard to
me. They made me pay for the very furniture at Portray." This wasn't true;
but it was true that Lizzie had endeavoured to palm off on the Eustace
estate bills for new things which she had ordered for her own country-
house. "I haven't near enough. I am in debt already. People talked as
though I were the richest woman in the world; but when it comes to be
spent, I ain't rich. Why should I give them up if they're my own?"

"Not if they're your own."

"If I give you a present and then die, people can't come and take it away
afterwards because I didn't put it into my will. There'd be no making
presents like that at all." This Lizzie said with an evident conviction in
the strength of her argument.

"But this necklace is so very valuable."

"That can't make a difference. If a thing is a man's own he can give it
away; not a house, or a farm, or a wood, or anything like that, but a
thing that he can carry about with him--of course he can give it away."

"But perhaps Sir Florian didn't mean to give it for always," suggested
Miss Macnulty.

"But perhaps he did. He told me that they were mine, and I shall keep
them. So that's the end of it. You can go to bed now." And Miss Macnulty
went to bed.

Lizzie, as she sat thinking of it, owned to herself that no help was to be
expected in that quarter. She was not angry with Miss Macnulty, who was,
almost of necessity, a poor creature. But she was convinced more strongly
than ever that some friend was necessary to her who should not be a poor
creature. Lord Fawn, though a peer, was a poor creature. Frank Greystock
she believed to be as strong as a house.




CHAPTER VII

MR. BURKE'S SPEECHES


Lucy Morris had been told by Lady Fawn that--in point of fact, that, being
a governess, she ought to give over falling in love with Frank Greystock,
and she had not liked it. Lady Fawn, no doubt, had used words less abrupt
--had probably used but few words, and had expressed her meaning chiefly
by little winks, and shakings of her head, and small gestures of her
hands, and had ended by a kiss--in all of which she had intended to mingle
mercy with justice, and had, in truth, been full of love. Nevertheless,
Lucy had not liked it. No girl likes to be warned against falling in love,
whether the warning be needed or not needed. In this case Lucy knew very
well that the caution was too late. It might be all very well for Lady
Fawn to decide that her governess should not receive visits from a lover
in her house; and then the governess might decide whether, in those
circumstances, she would remain or go away; but Lady Fawn could have no
right to tell her governess not to be in love. All this Lucy said to
herself over and over again, and yet she knew that Lady Fawn had treated
her well. The old woman had kissed her, and purred over her, and praised
her, and had really loved her. As a matter of course, Lucy was not
entitled to have a lover. Lucy knew that well enough. As she walked alone
among the shrubs she made arguments in defence of Lady Fawn as against
herself. And yet at every other minute she would blaze up into a grand
wrath, and picture to herself a scene in which she would tell Lady Fawn
boldly that as her lover had been banished from Fawn Court, she, Lucy,
would remain there no longer. There were but two objections to this
course. The first was that Frank Greystock was not her lover; and the
second, that on leaving Fawn Court she would not know whither to betake
herself. It was understood by everybody that she was never to leave Fawn
Court till an unexceptionable home should be found for her, either with
the Hittaways or elsewhere. Lady Fawn would no more allow her to go away,
depending for her future on the mere chance of some promiscuous
engagement, than she would have turned one of her own daughters out of the
house in the same forlorn condition. Lady Fawn was a tower of strength to
Lucy. But then a tower of strength may at any moment become a dungeon.

Frank Greystock was not her lover. Ah, there was the worst of it all! She
had given her heart and had got nothing in return. She conned it all over
in her own mind, striving to ascertain whether there was any real cause
for shame to her in her conduct. Had she been unmaidenly? Had she been too
forward with her heart? Had it been extracted from her, as women's hearts
are extracted, by efforts on the man's part; or had she simply chucked it
away from her to the first comer? Then she remembered certain scenes at
the deanery, words that had been spoken, looks that had been turned upon
her, a pressure of the hand late at night, a little whisper, a ribbon that
had been begged, a flower that had been given; and once, once----; then
there came a burning blush upon her cheek that there should have been so
much, and yet so little that was of avail. She had no right to say to any
one that the man was her lover. She had no right to assure herself that he
was her lover. But she knew that some wrong was done her in that he was
not her lover.

Of the importance of her own self as a living thing with a heart to suffer
and a soul to endure, she thought enough. She believed in herself,
thinking of herself, that should it ever be her lot to be a man's wife,
she would be to him a true, loving friend and companion, living in his
joys, and fighting, if it were necessary, down to the stumps of her nails
in his interests. But of what she had to give over and above her heart and
intellect she never thought at all. Of personal beauty she had very little
appreciation even in others. The form and face of Lady Eustace, which
indeed were very lovely, were distasteful to her; whereas she delighted to
look upon the broad, plain, colourless countenance of Lydia Fawn, who was
endeared to her by frank good-humour and an unselfish disposition. In
regard to men, she had never asked herself the question whether this man
was handsome or that man ugly. Of Frank Greystock she knew that his face
was full of quick intellect; and of Lord Fawn she knew that he bore no
outward index of mind. One man she not only loved, but could not help
loving. The other man, as regarded that sort of sympathy which marriage
should recognise, must always have been worlds asunder from her. She knew
that men demand that women shall possess beauty, and she certainly had
never thought of herself as beautiful; but it did not occur to her that on
that account she was doomed to fail. She was too strong-hearted for any
such fear. She did not think much of these things, but felt herself to be
so far endowed as to be fit to be the wife of such a man as Frank
Greystock. She was a proud, stout, self-confident, but still modest little
woman, too fond of truth to tell lies of herself even to herself. She was
possessed of a great power of sympathy, genial, very social, greatly given
to the mirth of conversation--though in talking she would listen much and
say but little. She was keenly alive to humour, and had at her command a
great fund of laughter, which would illumine her whole face without
producing a sound from her mouth. She knew herself to be too good to be a
governess for life; and yet how could it be otherwise with her?

Lady Linlithgow's visit to her niece had been made on a Thursday, and on
that same evening Frank Greystock had asked his question in the House of
Commons--or rather had made his speech about the Sawab of Mygawb. We all
know the meaning of such speeches. Had not Frank belonged to the party
that was out, and had not the resistance to the Sawab's claim come from
the party that was in, Frank would not probably have cared much about the
prince. We may be sure that he would not have troubled himself to read a
line of that very dull and long pamphlet of which he had to make himself
master before he could venture to stir in the matter, had not the road of
Opposition been open to him in that direction. But what exertion will not
a politician make with the view of getting the point of his lance within
the joints of his enemies' harness? Frank made his speech, and made it
very well. It was just the case for a lawyer, admitting that kind of
advocacy which it is a lawyer's business to practise. The Indian minister
of the day, Lord Fawn's chief, had determined, after much anxious
consideration, that it was his duty to resist the claim; and then, for
resisting it, he was attacked. Had he yielded to the claim, the attack
would have been as venomous, and very probably would have come from the
same quarter. No blame by such an assertion is cast upon the young
Conservative aspirant for party honours. It is thus the war is waged.
Frank Greystock took up the Sawab's case, and would have drawn mingled
tears and indignation from his hearers, had not his hearers all known the
conditions of the contest. On neither side did the hearers care much for
the Sawab's claims, but they felt that Greystock was making good his own
claims to some future reward from his party. He was very hard upon the
minister, and he was hard also upon Lord Fawn, stating that the cruelty of
Government ascendancy had never been put forward as a doctrine in plainer
terms than those which had been used in "another place" in reference to
the wrongs of this poor ill-used native chieftain. This was very grievous
to Lord Fawn, who had personally desired to favour the ill-used chieftain;
and harder again because he and Greystock were intimate with each other.
He felt the thing keenly, and was full of his grievance when, in
accordance with his custom, he came down to Fawn Court on the Saturday
evening.

The Fawn family, which consisted entirely of women, dined early. On
Saturdays, when his lordship would come down, a dinner was prepared for
him alone. On Sundays they all dined together at three o'clock. On Sunday
evening Lord Fawn would return to town to prepare himself for his Monday's
work. Perhaps, also, he disliked the sermon which Lady Fawn always read to
the assembled household at nine o'clock on Sunday evening. On this
Saturday he came out into the grounds after dinner, where the oldest
unmarried daughter, the present Miss Fawn, was walking with Lucy Morris.
It was almost a summer evening; so much so, that some of the party had
been sitting on the garden benches, and four of the girls were still
playing croquet on the lawn, though there was hardly light enough to see
the balls. Miss Fawn had already told Lucy that her brother was very angry
with Mr. Greystock. Now, Lucy's sympathies were all with Frank and the
Sawab. She had endeavoured, indeed, and had partially succeeded, in
perverting the Under-Secretary. Nor did she now intend to change her
opinions, although all the Fawn girls, and Lady Fawn, were against her.
When a brother or a son is an Under-Secretary of State, sisters and
mothers will constantly be on the side of the Government, so far as that
Under-Secretary's office is concerned.

"Upon my word, Frederic," said Augusta Fawn, "I do think Mr. Greystock was
too bad."

"There's nothing these fellows won't say or do," exclaimed Lord Fawn. "I
can't understand it myself. When I've been in opposition, I never did that
kind of thing."

"I wonder whether it was because he is angry with mamma," said Miss Fawn.
Everybody who knew the Fawns knew that Augusta Fawn was not clever, and
that she would occasionally say the very thing that ought not to be said.

"Oh, dear, no," said the Under-Secretary, who could not endure the idea
that the weak women-mind of his family should have, in any way, an
influence on the august doings of Parliament.

"You know mamma did----"

"Nothing of that kind at all," said his lordship, putting down his sister
with great authority. "Mr. Greystock is simply not an honest politician.
That is about the whole of it. He chose to attack me because there was an
opportunity. There isn't a man in either House who cares for such things,
personally, less than I do." Had his lordship said "more than he did," he
might perhaps have been correct. "But I can't bear the feeling. The fact
is, a lawyer never understands what is and what is not fair fighting."

Lucy felt her face tingling with heat, and was preparing to say a word in
defence of that special lawyer, when Lady Fawn's voice was heard from the
drawing-room window. "Come in, girls. It's nine o'clock." In that house
Lady Fawn reigned supreme, and no one ever doubted for a moment as to her
obedience. The clicking of the balls ceased, and those who were walking
immediately turned their faces to the drawing-room window. But Lord Fawn,
who was not one of the girls, took another turn by himself, thinking of
the wrongs he had endured.

"Frederic is so angry about Mr. Greystock," said Augusta, as soon as they
were seated.

"I do feel that it was provoking," said the second sister.

"And considering that Mr. Greystock has so often been here, I don't think
it was kind," said the third.

Lydia did not speak, but could not refrain from glancing her eyes at
Lucy's face. "I believe everything is considered fair in Parliament," said
Lady Fawn.

Then Lord Fawn, who had heard the last words, entered through the window.
"I don't know about that, mother," said he. "Gentlemanlike conduct is the
same everywhere. There are things that may be said and there are things
which may not. Mr. Greystock has altogether gone beyond the usual limits,
and I shall take care that he knows my opinion."

"You are not going to quarrel with the man?" asked the mother.

"I am not going to fight him, if you mean that; but I shall let him know
that I think that he has transgressed." This his lordship said with that
haughty superiority which a man may generally display with safety among
the women of his own family.

Lucy had borne a great deal, knowing well that it was better that she
should bear such injury in silence; but there was a point beyond which she
could not endure it. It was intolerable to her that Mr. Greystock's
character as a gentleman should be impugned before all the ladies of the
family, every one of whom did, in fact, know her liking for the man. And
then it seemed to her that she could rush into the battle, giving a side
blow at his lordship on behalf of his absent antagonist, but appearing to
fight for the Sawab. There had been a time when the poor Sawab was in
favour at Fawn Court. "I think Mr. Greystock was right to say all he could
for the prince. If he took up the cause, he was bound to make the best of
it." She spoke with energy and with a heightened colour; and Lady Fawn,
hearing her, shook her head at her.

"Did you read Mr. Greystock's speech, Miss Morris?" asked Lord Fawn.

"Every word of it, in the 'Times.'"

"And you understood his allusion to what I had been called upon to say in
the House of Lords on behalf of the Government?"

"I suppose I did. It did not seem to be difficult to understand."

"I do think Mr. Greystock should have abstained from attacking Frederic,"
said Augusta.

"It was not--not quite the thing that we are accustomed to," said Lord
Fawn.

"Of course I don't know about that," said Lucy. "I think the prince is
being used very ill, that he is being deprived of his own property, that
he is kept out of his rights, just because he is weak, and I am very glad
that there is some one to speak up for him."

"My dear Lucy," said Lady Fawn, "if you discuss politics with Lord Fawn,
you'll get the worst of it."

"I don't at all object to Miss Morris's views about the Sawab," said the
Under-Secretary, generously. "There is a great deal to be said on both
sides. I know of old that Miss Morris is a great friend of the Sawab."

"You used to be his friend, too," said Lucy.

"I felt for him, and do feel for him. All that is very well. I ask no one
to agree with me on the question itself. I only say that Mr. Greystock's
mode of treating it was unbecoming."

"I think it was the very best speech I ever read in my life," said Lucy,
with headlong energy and heightened colour.

"Then, Miss Morris, you and I have very different opinions about
speeches," said Lord Fawn, with severity. "You have, probably, never read
Burke's speeches."

"And I don't want to read them," said Lucy.

"That is another question," said Lord Fawn; and his tone and manner were
very severe indeed.

"We are talking about speeches in Parliament," said Lucy. Poor Lucy! She
knew quite as well as did Lord Fawn that Burke had been a House of Commons
orator; but in her impatience, and from absence of the habit of argument,
she omitted to explain that she was talking about the speeches of the day.

Lord Fawn held up his hands, and put his head a little on one side. "My
dear Lucy," said Lady Fawn, "you are showing your ignorance. Where do you
suppose that Mr. Burke's speeches were made?"

"Of course I know they were made in Parliament," said Lucy, almost in
tears.

"If Miss Morris means that Burke's greatest efforts were not made in
Parliament, that his speech to the electors of Bristol, for instance, and
his opening address on the trial of Warren Hastings, were, upon the whole,
superior to----"

"I didn't mean anything at all," said Lucy.

"Lord Fawn is trying to help you, my dear," said Lady Fawn.

"I don't want to be helped," said Lucy. "I only mean that I thought Mr.
Greystock's speech as good as it could possibly be. There wasn't a word in
it that didn't seem to me to be just what it ought to be. I do think that
they are ill-treating that poor Indian prince, and I am very glad that
somebody has had the courage to get up and say so."

No doubt it would have been better that Lucy should have held her tongue.
Had she simply been upholding against an opponent a political speaker
whose speech she had read with pleasure, she might have held her own in
the argument against the whole Fawn family. She was a favourite with them
all, and even the Under-Secretary would not have been hard upon her. But
there had been more than this for poor Lucy to do. Her heart was so truly
concerned in the matter that she could not refrain herself from resenting
an attack on the man she loved. She had allowed herself to be carried into
superlatives, and had almost been uncourteous to Lord Fawn. "My dear,"
said Lady Fawn, "we won't say anything more upon the subject." Lord Fawn
took up a book. Lady Fawn busied herself in her knitting. Lydia assumed a
look of unhappiness, as though something very sad had occurred. Augusta
addressed a question to her brother in a tone which plainly indicated a
feeling on her part that her brother had been ill-used and was entitled to
especial consideration. Lucy sat silent and still, and then left the room
with a hurried step. Lydia at once rose to follow her, but was stopped by
her mother. "You had better leave her alone just at present, my dear,"
said Lady Fawn.

"I did not know that Miss Morris was so particularly interested in Mr.
Greystock," said Lord Fawn.

"She has known him since she was a child," said his mother, About an hour
afterwards Lady Fawn went up-stairs and found Lucy sitting all alone in
the still so-called school-room. She had no candle, and had made no
pretence to do anything since she had left the room down-stairs. In the
interval family prayers had been read, and Lucy's absence was unusual and
contrary to rule. "Lucy, my dear, why are you sitting here?" said Lady
Fawn.

"Because I am unhappy."

"What makes you unhappy, Lucy?"

"I don't know. I would rather you didn't ask me. I suppose I behaved badly
down-stairs."

"My son would forgive you in a moment if you asked him."

"No; certainly not. I can beg your pardon, Lady Fawn, but not his. Of
course I had no right to talk about speeches, and politics, and this
prince in your drawing-room."

"Lucy, you astonish me."

"But it is so. Dear Lady Fawn, don't look like that. I know how good you
are to me. I know you let me do things which other governesses mayn't do;
and say things; but still I am a governess, and I know I misbehaved--to
you." Then Lucy burst into tears.

Lady Fawn, in whose bosom there was no stony corner or morsel of hard
iron, was softened at once. "My dear, you are more like another daughter
to me than anything else."

"Dear Lady Fawn!"

"But it makes me unhappy when I see your mind engaged about Mr. Greystock.
There is the truth, Lucy. You should not think of Mr. Greystock. Mr.
Greystock is a man who has his way to make in the world, and could not
marry you, even if, under other circumstances, he would wish to do so. You
know how frank I am with you, giving you credit for honest, sound good
sense. To me and to my girls, who know you as a lady, you are as dear a
friend as though you were--anything you may please to think. Lucy Morris
is to us our own dear, dear little friend Lucy. But Mr. Greystock, who is
a member of Parliament, could not marry a governess."

"But I love him so dearly," said Lucy, getting up from her chair, "that
his slightest word is to me more than all the words of all the world
beside. It is no use, Lady Fawn. I do love him, and I don't mean to try to
give it up." Lady Fawn stood silent for a moment, and then suggested that
it would be better for them both to go to bed. During that minute she had
been unable to decide what she had better say or do in the present
emergency.




CHAPTER VIII

THE CONQUERING HERO COMES


The reader will perhaps remember that when Lizzie Eustace was told that
her aunt was down-stairs Frank Greystock was with her, and that he
promised to return on the following day to hear the result of the
interview. Had Lady Linlithgow not come at that very moment Frank would
probably have asked his rich cousin to be his wife. She had told him that
she was solitary and unhappy; and after that what else could he have done
but ask her to be his wife? The old countess, however, arrived and
interrupted him. He went away abruptly, promising to come on the morrow;
but on the morrow he never came. It was a Friday, and Lizzie remained at
home for him the whole morning. When four o'clock was passed she knew that
he would be at the House. But still she did not stir. And she contrived
that Miss Macnulty should be absent the entire day. Miss Macnulty was even
made to go to the play by herself in the evening. But her absence was of
no service. Frank Greystock came not; and at eleven at night Lizzie swore
to herself that should he ever come again, he should come in vain.
Nevertheless, through the whole of Saturday she expected him with more or
less of confidence, and on the Sunday morning she was still well inclined
toward him. It might be that he would come on that day. She could
understand that a man with his hands so full of business as were those of
her cousin Frank should find himself unable to keep an appointment. Nor
would there be fair ground for permanent anger with such a one, even
should he forget an appointment. But surely he would come on the Sunday!
She had been quite sure that the offer was about to be made when that
odious old harridan had come in and disturbed everything. Indeed, the
offer had been all but made. She had felt the premonitory flutter, had
asked herself the important question, and had answered it. She had told
herself that the thing would do. Frank was not the exact hero that her
fancy had painted, but he was sufficiently heroic. Everybody said that he
would work his way up to the top of the tree, and become a rich man. At
any rate she had resolved; and then Lady Linlithgow had come in! Surely he
would come on the Sunday.

He did not come on the Sunday, but Lord Fawn did come. Immediately after
morning church Lord Fawn declared his intention of returning at once from
Fawn Court to town. He was very silent at breakfast, and his sisters
surmised that he was still angry with poor Lucy. Lucy, too, was unlike
herself, was silent, sad, and oppressed. Lady Fawn was serious, and almost
solemn; so that there was little even of holy mirth at Fawn Court on that
Sunday morning. The whole family, however, went to church, and immediately
on their return Lord Fawn expressed his intention of returning to town.
All the sisters felt that an injury had been done to them by Lucy. It was
only on Sundays that their dinner-table was graced by the male member of
the family, and now he was driven away. "I am sorry that you are going to
desert us, Frederic," said Lady Fawn. Lord Fawn muttered something as to
absolute necessity, and went. The afternoon was very dreary at Fawn Court.
Nothing was said on the subject; but there was still the feeling that Lncy
had offended. At four o'clock on that Sunday afternoon Lord Fawn was
closeted with Lady Eustace.

The "closeting" consisted simply in the fact that Miss Macnulty was not
present. Lizzie fully appreciated the pleasure, and utility, and general
convenience of having a companion, but she had no scruple whatever in
obtaining absolute freedom for herself when she desired it. "My dear," she
would say, "the best friends in the world shouldn't always be together;
should they? Wouldn't you like to go to the Horticultural?" Then Miss
Macnulty would go to the Horticultural, or else up into her own bedroom.
When Lizzie was beginning to wax wrathful again because Frank Greystock
did not come, Lord Fawn made his appearance. "How kind this is," said
Lizzie. "I thought you were always at Richmond on Sundays."

"I have just come up from my mother's," said Lord Fawn, twiddling his hat.
Then Lizzie, with a pretty eagerness, asked after Lady Fawn and the girls,
and her dear little friend Lucy Morris. Lizzie could be very prettily
eager when she pleased. She leaned forward her face as she asked her
questions, and threw back her loose lustrous lock of hair, with her long
lithe fingers covered with diamonds--the diamonds, these, which Sir
Florian had really given her, or which she had procured from Mr. Benjamin
in the clever manner described in the opening chapter. "They are all quite
well, thank you," said Lord Fawn. "I believe Miss Morris is quite well,
though she was a little out of sorts last night."

"She is not ill, I hope," said Lizzie, bringing the lustrous lock forward
again.

"In her temper, I mean," said Lord Fawn.

"Indeed! I hope Miss Lucy is not forgetting herself. That would be very
sad, after the great kindness she has received." Lord Fawn said that it
would be very sad, and then put his hat down upon the floor. It came upon
Lizzie at that moment, as by a flash of lightning--by an electric message
delivered to her intellect by that movement of the hat--that she might be
sure of Lord Fawn if she chose to take him. On Friday she might have been
sure of Frank, only that Lady Linlithgow came in the way. But now she did
not feel at all sure of Frank. Lord Fawn was at any rate a peer. She had
heard that he was a poor peer--but a peer, she thought, can't be
altogether poor. And though he was a stupid owl--she did not hesitate to
acknowledge to herself that he was as stupid as an owl--he had a position.
He was one of the Government, and his wife would, no doubt, be able to go
anywhere. It was becoming essential to her that she should marry. Even
though her husband should give up the diamonds, she would not in such case
incur the disgrace of surrendering them herself. She would have kept them
till she had ceased to be a Eustace. Frank had certainly meant it on that
Thursday afternoon; but surely he would have been in Mount street before
this if he had not changed his mind. We all know that a bird in the hand
is worth two in the bush. "I have been at Fawn Court once or twice," said
Lizzie, with her sweetest grace, "and I always think it a model of a real
family happiness."

"I hope you may be there very often," said Lord Fawn.

"Ah, I have no right to intrude myself often on your mother, Lord Fawn."

There could hardly be a better opening than this for him had he chosen to
accept it. But it was not thus that he had arranged it--for he made his
arrangements. "There would be no feeling of that kind, I am sure," he
said. And then he was silent. How was he to deploy himself on the ground
before him so as to make the strategy which he had prepared answer the
occasion of the day? "Lady Eustace," he said, "I don't know what your
views of life may be."

"I have a child, you know, to bring up."

"Ah, yes; that gives a great interest, of course."

"He will inherit a very large fortune, Lord Fawn; too large, I fear, to be
of service to a youth of one-and-twenty; and I must endeavour to fit him
for the possession of it. That is, and always must be, the chief object of
my existence." Then she felt that she had said too much. He was just the
man who would be fool enough to believe her. "Not but what it is hard to
do it. A mother can of course devote herself to her child; but when a
portion of the devotion must be given to the preservation of material
interests there is less of tenderness in it. Don't you think so?"

"No doubt," said Lord Fawn; "no doubt." But he had not followed her, and
was still thinking of his own strategy. "It's a comfort, of course, to
know that one's child is provided for."

"Oh, yes; but they tell me the poor little dear will have forty thousand a
year when he's of age; and when I look at him in his little bed, and press
him in my arms, and think of all that money, I almost wish that his father
had been a poor plain gentleman." Then the handkerchief was put to her
eyes, and Lord Fawn had a moment in which to collect himself.

"Ah! I myself am a poor man, for my rank, I mean."

"A man with your position, Lord Fawn, and your talents and genius for
business, can never be poor."

"My father's property was all Irish, you know."

"Was it indeed?"

"And he was an Irish peer till Lord Melbourne gave him an English
peerage."

"An Irish peer, was he?" Lizzie understood nothing of this, but presumed
that an Irish peer was a peer who had not sufficient money to live upon.
Lord Fawn, however, was endeavouring to describe his own history in as few
words as possible.

"He was then made Lord Fawn of Richmond, in the peerage of the United
Kingdom. Fawn Court, you know, belonged to my mother's father before my
mother's marriage. The property in Ireland is still mine, but there's no
place on it."

"Indeed!"

"There was a house, but my father allowed it to tumble down. It's in
Tipperary; not at all a desirable country to live in."

"Oh dear, no! Don't they murder the people?"

"It's about five thousand a year, and out of that my mother has half for
her life."

"What an excellent family arrangement," said Lizzie. There was so long a
pause made between each statement that she was forced to make some reply.

"You see, for a peer, the fortune is very small indeed."

"But then you have a salary, don't you?"

"At present I have; but no one can tell how long that may last."

"I'm sure it's for everybody's good that it should go on for ever so many
years," said Lizzie.

"Thank you," said Lord Fawn. "I'm afraid, however, there are a great many
people who don't think so. Your cousin Greystock would do anything on
earth to turn us out."

"Luckily my cousin Frank has not much power," said Lizzie. And in saying
it she threw into her tone, and into her countenance, a certain amount of
contempt for Frank as a man and as a politician, which was pleasant to
Lord Fawn.

"Now," said he, "I have told you everything about myself which I was
bound, as a man of honour, to tell before I--I--I----. In short, you know
what I mean."

"Oh, Lord Fawn!"

"I have told you everything. I owe no money, but I could not afford to
marry a wife without an income. I admire you more than any woman I ever
saw. I love you with all my heart." He was now standing upright before
her, with the fingers of his right hand touching his left breast, and
there was something almost of dignity in his gesture and demeanour. "It
may be that you are determined never to marry again. I can only say that
if you will trust yourself to me--yourself and your child--I will do my
duty truly by you both, and will make your happiness the chief object of
my existence." When she had listened to him thus far, of course she must
accept him; but he was by no means aware of that. She sat silent, with her
hands folded on her breast, looking down upon the ground; but he did not
as yet attempt to seat himself by her. "Lady Eustace," he continued, "may
I venture to entertain a hope?"

"May I not have an hour to think of it," said Lizzie, just venturing to
turn a glance of her eye upon his face.

"Oh, certainly. I will call again whenever you may bid me."

Now she was silent for two or three minutes, during which he still stood
over her. But he had dropped his hand from his breast, and had stooped,
and picked up his hat ready for his departure. Was he to come again on
Monday, or Tuesday, or Wednesday? Let her tell him that and he would go.
He doubtless reflected that Wednesday would suit him best, because there
would be no House. But Lizzie was too magnanimous for this. "Lord Fawn,"
she said, rising, "you have paid me the greatest compliment that a man can
pay a woman. Coming from you it is doubly precious; first, because of your
character; and secondly----"

"Why secondly?"

"Secondly, because I can love you." This was said in her lowest whisper,
and then she moved toward him gently, and almost laid her head upon his
breast. Of course he put his arm round her waist, but it was first
necessary that he should once more disembarrass himself of his hat, and
then her head was upon his breast.

"Dearest Lizzie," he said.

"Dearest Frederic," she murmured.

"I shall write to my mother to-night," he said.

"Do, do, dear Frederic."

"And she will come to you at once, I am sure."

"I will receive her and love her as a mother," said Lizzie, with all her
energy. Then he kissed her again, her forehead and her lips, and took his
leave, promising to be with her at any rate on Wednesday.

"Lady Fawn!" she said to herself. The name did not sound so well as that
of Lady Eustace. But it is much to be a wife; and more to be a peeress.




CHAPTER IX

SHOWING WHAT THE MISS FAWNS SAID, AND WHAT MRS. HITTAWAY THOUGHT


In the way of duty Lord Fawn was a Hercules, not, indeed, "climbing trees
in the Hesperides," but achieving enterprises which to other men, if not
impossible, would have been so unpalatable as to have been put aside as
impracticable. On the Monday morning after he was accepted by Lady
Eustace, he was with his mother at Fawn Court before he went down to the
India Office.

He had at least been very honest in the description he had given of his
own circumstances to the lady whom he intended to marry. He had told her
the exact truth; and though she, with all her cleverness, had not been
able to realise the facts when related to her so suddenly, still enough
had been said to make it quite clear that, when details of business should
hereafter be discussed in a less hurried manner, he would be able to say
that he had explained all his circumstances before he had made his offer.
And he had been careful, too, as to her affairs. He had ascertained that
her late husband had certainly settled upon her for life an estate worth
four thousand a year. He knew, also, that eight thousand pounds had been
left her, but of that he took no account. It might be probable that she
would have spent it. If any of it were left, it would be a godsend. Lord
Fawn thought a great deal about money. Being a poor man, filling a place
fit only for rich men, he had been driven to think of money, and had
become self-denying and parsimonious, perhaps we may say hungry and close-
fisted. Such a condition of character is the natural consequence of such a
position. There is, probably, no man who becomes naturally so hard in
regard to money as he who is bound to live among rich men, who is not rich
himself, and who is yet honest. The weight of the work of life in these
circumstances is so crushing, requires such continued thought, and makes
itself so continually felt, that the mind of the sufferer is never free
from the contamination of sixpences. Of such a one it is not fair to judge
as of other men with similar incomes. Lord Fawn had declared to his future
bride that he had half five thousand a year to spend, or the half, rather,
of such actual income as might be got in from an estate presumed to give
five thousand a year, and it may be said that an unmarried gentleman ought
not to be poor with such an income. But Lord Fawn unfortunately was a
lord, unfortunately was a landlord, unfortunately was an Irish landlord.
Let him be as careful as he might with his sixpences, his pounds would fly
from him, or, as might perhaps be better said, could not be made to fly to
him. He was very careful with his sixpences, and was always thinking, not
exactly how he might make two ends meet, but how to reconcile the
strictest personal economy with the proper bearing of an English nobleman.

Such a man almost naturally looks to marriage as an assistance in the
dreary fight. It soon becomes clear to him that he cannot marry without
money, and he learns to think that heiresses have been invented exactly to
suit his taste. He is conscious of having been subjected to hardship by
Fortune, and regards female wealth as his legitimate mode of escape from
it. He has got himself, his position, and perhaps his title, to dispose
of, and they are surely worth so much per annum. As for giving anything
away, that is out of the question. He has not been so placed as to be able
to give. But, being an honest man, he will, if possible, make a fair
bargain. Lord Fawn was certainly an honest man, and he had been
endeavouring for the last six or seven years to make a fair bargain. But
then it is so hard to decide what is fair. Who is to tell a Lord Fawn how
much per annum he ought to regard himself as worth? He had, on one or two
occasions, asked a high price, but no previous bargain had been made. No
doubt he had come down a little in his demand in suggesting a matrimonial
arrangement to a widow with a child, and with only four thousand a year.
Whether or no that income was hers in perpetuity, or only for life, he had
not positively known when he made his offer. The will made by Sir Florian
Eustace did not refer to the property at all. In the natural course of
things, the widow would only have a life-interest in the income. Why
should Sir Florian make away, in perpetuity, with his family property?
Nevertheless, there had been a rumour abroad that Sir Florian had been
very generous; that the Scotch estate was to go to a second son in the
event of there being a second son; but that otherwise it was to be at the
widow's own disposal. No doubt, had Lord Fawn been persistent, he might
have found out the exact truth. He had, however, calculated that he could
afford to accept even the life-income. If more should come of it, so much
the better for him. He might, at any rate, so arrange the family matters
that his heir, should he have one, should not at his death be called upon
to pay something more than half the proceeds of the family property to his
mother, as was now done by himself.

Lord Fawn breakfasted at Fawn Court on the Monday, and his mother sat at
the table with him, pouring out his tea. "Oh, Frederic," she said, "it is
so important!"

"Just so; very important indeed. I should like you to call and see her
either to-day or to-morrow."

"That's of course."

"And you had better get her down here."

"I don't know that she'll come. Ought I to ask the little boy?"

"Certainly," said Lord Fawn, as he put a spoonful of egg into his mouth;
"certainly."

"And Miss Macnulty?"

"No; I don't see that at all. I'm not going to marry Miss Macnulty. The
child, of course, must be one of us."

"And what is the income, Frederic?"

"Four thousand a year. Something more nominally, but four thousand to
spend."

"You are sure about that?"

"Quite sure."

"And for ever?"

"I believe so. Of that I am not sure."

"It makes a great difference, Frederic."

"A very great difference indeed. I think it is her own. But at any rate
she is much younger than I am, and there need be no settlement out of my
property. That is the great thing. Don't you think she's--nice?"

"She is very lovely."

"And clever?"

"Certainly very clever. I hope she is not self-willed, Frederic."

"If she is, we must try and balance it," said Lord Fawn, with a little
smile. But in truth, he had thought nothing about any such quality as that
to which his mother now referred. The lady had an income. That was the
first and most indispensable consideration. She was fairly well-born, was
a lady, and was beautiful. In doing Lord Fawn justice, we must allow that,
in all his attempted matrimonial speculations, some amount of feminine
loveliness had been combined with feminine wealth. He had for two years
been a suitor of Violet Effingham, who was the acknowledged beauty of the
day--of Violet Effingham, who at the present time was the wife of Lord
Chiltern; and he had offered himself thrice to Madame Max Goesler, who was
reputed to be as rich as she was beautiful. In either case, the fortune
would have been greater than that which he would now win, and the money
would certainly have been for ever. But in these attempts he had failed;
and Lord Fawn was not a man to think himself ill-used because he did not
get the first good thing for which he asked.

"I suppose I may tell the girls?" said Lady Fawn.

"Yes, when I am gone. I must be off now, only I could not bear not to come
and see you."

"It was so like you, Frederic."

"And you'll go to-day?"

"Yes, if you wish it--certainly."

"Go up in the carriage, you know, and take one of the girls with you. I
would not take more than one. Augusta will be the best. You'll see Clara,
I suppose." Clara was the married sister, Mrs. Hittaway.

"If you wish it."

"She had better call too--say on Thursday. It's quite as well that it
should be known. I sha'n't choose to have more delay than can be avoided.
Well, I believe that's all."

"I hope she'll be a good wife to you, Frederic."

"I don't see why she shouldn't. Good-by, mother. Tell the girls I will see
them next Saturday." He didn't see why this woman he was about to marry
should not be a good wife to him! And yet he knew nothing about her, and
had not taken the slightest trouble to make inquiry. That she was pretty
he could see; that she was clever he could understand; that she lived in
Mount street was a fact; her parentage was known to him; that she was the
undoubted mistress of a large income was beyond dispute. But, for aught he
knew, she might be afflicted by every vice to which a woman can be
subject. In truth, she was afflicted by so many, that the addition of all
the others could hardly have made her worse than she was. She had never
sacrificed her beauty to a lover--she had never sacrificed anything to
anybody--nor did she drink. It would be difficult, perhaps, to say
anything else in her favour; and yet Lord Fawn was quite content to marry
her, not having seen any reason why she should not make a good wife! Nor
had Sir Florian seen any reason; but she had broken Sir Florian's heart.

When the girls heard the news they were half frightened and half
delighted. Lady Fawn and her daughters lived very much out of the world.
They also were poor rich people--if such a term may be used--and did not
go much into society. There was a butler kept at Fawn Court, and a boy in
buttons, and two gardeners, and a man to look after the cows, and a
carriage and horses, and a fat coachman. There was a cook and a scullery
maid, and two lady's maids--who had to make the dresses--and two
housemaids and a dairy-maid. There was a large old brick house to be kept
in order, and handsome grounds with old trees. There was, as we know, a
governess, and there were seven unmarried daughters. With such
incumbrances, and an income altogether not exceeding three thousand pounds
per annum, Lady Fawn could not be rich. And yet who would say that an old
lady and her daughters could be poor with three thousand pounds a year to
spend? It may be taken almost as a rule by the unennobled ones of this
country, that the sudden possession of a title would at once raise the
price of every article consumed twenty per cent. Mutton that before cost
ninepence would cost tenpence a pound, and the mouths to be fed would
demand more meat. The chest of tea would run out quicker. The labourer's
work, which for the farmer is ten hours a day, for the squire nine, is for
the peer only eight. Miss Jones, when she becomes Lady de Jongh, does not
pay less than threepence apiece for each "my lady" with which her ear is
tickled. Even the baronet when he becomes a lord has to curtail his
purchases because of increased price, unless he be very wide awake to the
affairs of the world. Old Lady Fawn, who would not on any account have
owed a shilling which she could not pay, and who, in the midst of her
economies, was not close-fisted, knew very well what she could do and what
she could not. The old family carriage and the two lady's maids were
there, as necessaries of life; but London society was not within her
reach. It was, therefore, the case that they had not heard very much about
Lizzie Eustace. But they had heard something. "I hope she won't be too
fond of going out," said Amelia, the second girl.

"Or extravagant," said Georgiana, the third.

"There was some story of her being terribly in debt when she married Sir
Florian Eustace," said Diana, the fourth.

"Frederic will be sure to see to that," said Augusta, the eldest.

"She is very beautiful," said Lydia, the fifth.

"And clever," said Cecilia, the sixth.

"Beauty and cleverness won't made a good wife," said Amelia, who was the
wise one of the family.

"Frederic will be sure to see that she doesn't go wrong," said Augusta,
who was not wise.

Then Lucy Morris entered the room with Nina, the cadette of the family.
"Oh, Nina, what do you think?" said Lydia.

"My dear!" said Lady Fawn, putting up her hand and stopping further
indiscreet speech.

"Oh, mamma, what is it?" asked the cadette.

"Surely Lucy may be told," said Lydia.

"Well, yes; Lucy may be told certainly. There can be no reason why Lucy
should not know all that concerns our family; and the more so as she has
been for many years intimate with the lady. My dear, my son is going to be
married to Lady Eustace."

"Lord Fawn going to marry Lizzie!" said Lucy Morris, in a tone which
certainly did not express unmingled satisfaction.

"Unless you forbid the banns," said Diana.

"Is there any reason why he should not?" said Lady Fawn.

"Oh, no; only it seems so odd. I didn't know that they knew each other;
not well, that is. And then----"

"Then what, my dear?"

"It seems odd; that's all. It's all very nice, I dare say, and I'm sure I
hope they will be happy." Lady Fawn, however, was displeased, and did not
speak to Lucy again before she started with Augusta on the journey to
London.

The carriage first stopped at the door of the married daughter in Warwick
Square. Now Mrs. Hittaway, whose husband was chairman of the Board of
Civil Appeals, and who was very well known at all Boards and among
official men generally, heard much more about things that were going on
than did her mother. And, having been emancipated from maternal control
for the last ten or twelve years, she could express herself before her
mother with more confidence than would have become the other girls.
"Mamma," she said, "you don't mean it!"

"I do mean it, Clara. Why should I not mean it?"

"She is the greatest vixen in all London."

"Oh, Clara!" said Augusta.

"And such a liar," said Mrs. Hittaway.

There came a look of pain across Lady Fawn's face, for Lady Fawn believed
in her eldest daughter. But yet she intended to fight her ground on a
matter so important to her as was this. "There is no word in the English
language," she said, "which conveys to me so little of defined meaning as
that word vixen. If you can, tell me what you mean, Clara."

"Stop it, mamma."

"But why should I stop it, even if I could?"

"You don't know her, mamma."

"She has visited at Fawn Court more than once. She is a friend of Lucy's."

"If she is a friend of Lucy Morris, mamma, Lucy Morris shall never come
here."

"But what has she done? I have never heard that she has behaved
improperly. What does it all mean? She goes out everywhere. I don't think
she has had any lovers. Frederic would be the last man in the world to
throw himself away upon an ill-conditioned young woman."

"Frederic can see just as far as some other men, and not a bit further. Of
course she has an income--for her life."

"I believe it is her own altogether, Clara."

"She says so, I don't doubt. I believe she is the greatest liar about
London. You find out about her jewels before she married poor Sir Florian,
and how much he had to pay for her. Or rather, I'll find out. If you want
to know, mamma, you just ask her own aunt, Lady Linlithgow."

"We all know, my dear, that Lady Linlithgow quarrelled with her."

"It's my belief that she is over head and ears in debt again. But I'll
learn. And when I have found out, I shall not scruple to tell Frederic.
Orlando will find out all about it." Orlando was the Christian name of
Mrs. Hittaway's husband. "Mr. Camperdown, I have no doubt, knows all the
ins and outs of her story. The long and the short of it is this, mamma,
that I've heard quite enough about Lady Eustace to feel certain that
Frederic would live to repent it."

"But what can we do?" said Lady Fawn.

"Break it off," said Mrs. Hittaway.

Her daughter's violence of speech had a most depressing effect upon poor
Lady Fawn. As has been said, she did believe in Mrs. Hittaway. She knew
that Mrs. Hittaway was conversant with the things of the world, and heard
tidings daily which never found their way down to Fawn Court. And yet her
son went about quite as much as did her daughter. If Lady Eustace was such
a reprobate as was now represented, why had not Lord Fawn heard the truth?
And then she had already given in her own adhesion, and had promised to
call. "Do you mean that you won't go to her?" said Lady Fawn.

"As Lady Eustace? certainly not. If Frederic does marry her, of course I
must know her. That's a different thing. One has to make the best one can
of a bad bargain. I don't doubt they'd be separated before two years were
over."

"Oh, dear, how dreadful!" exclaimed Augusta. Lady Fawn, after much
consideration, was of opinion that she must carry out her intention of
calling upon her son's intended bride in spite of all the evil things that
had been said. Lord Fawn had undertaken to send a message to Mount street,
informing the lady of the honour intended for her. And in truth Lady Fawn
was somewhat curious now to see the household of the woman who might
perhaps do her the irreparable injury of ruining the happiness of her only
son. Perhaps she might learn something by looking at the woman in her own
drawing-room. At any rate she would go. But Mrs. Hittaway's words had the
effect of inducing her to leave Augusta where she was. If there were
contamination, why should Augusta be contaminated? Poor Augusta! She had
looked forward to the delight of embracing her future sister-in-law; and
would not have enjoyed it the less, perhaps, because she had been told
that the lady was false, profligate, and a vixen. As, however, her
position was that of a girl, she was bound to be obedient, though over
thirty years old, and she obeyed.

Lizzie was of course at home, and Miss Macnulty was of course visiting the
Horticultural gardens or otherwise engaged. On such an occasion Lizzie
would certainly be alone. She had taken great pains with her dress,
studying not so much her own appearance as the character of her visitor.
She was very anxious, at any rate for the present, to win golden opinions
from Lady Fawn. She was dressed richly, but very simply. Everything about
her room betokened wealth; but she had put away the French novels, and had
placed a Bible on a little table, not quite hidden, behind her own seat.
The long lustrous lock was tucked up, but the diamonds were still upon her
fingers. She fully intended to make a conquest of her future mother-in-law
and sister-in-law; for the note which had come up to her from the India
Office had told her that Augusta would accompany Lady Fawn. "Augusta is my
favourite sister," said the enamoured lover, "and I hope that you two will
always be friends." Lizzie, when she had read this, had declared to
herself that of all the female oafs she had ever seen, Augusta Fawn was
the greatest oaf. When she found that Lady Fawn was alone, she did not
betray herself, or ask for the beloved friend of the future. "Dear, dear
Lady Fawn," she said, throwing herself into the arms and nestling herself
against the bosom of the old lady, "this makes my happiness perfect." Then
she retreated a little, still holding the hand she had grasped between her
own, and looking up into the face of her future mother-in-law. "When he
asked me to be his wife, the first thing I thought of was whether you
would come to me at once." Her voice as she thus spoke was perfect. Her
manner was almost perfect. Perhaps there was a little too much of gesture,
too much gliding motion, too violent an appeal with the eyes, too close a
pressure of the hand. No suspicion, however, of all this would have
touched Lady Fawn had she come to Mount street without calling in Warwick
Square on the way. But those horrible words of her daughter were ringing
in her ears, and she did not know how to conduct herself.

"Of course I came as soon as he told me," she said.

"And you will be a mother to me?" demanded Lizzie.

Poor Lady Fawn! There was enough of maternity about her to have enabled
her to undertake the duty for a dozen sons' wives--if the wives were women
with whom she could feel sympathy. And she could feel sympathy very
easily, and she was a woman not at all prone to inquire too curiously as
to the merits of a son's wife. But what was she to do after the caution
she had received from Mrs. Hittaway? How was she to promise maternal
tenderness to a vixen and a liar? By nature she was not a deceitful woman.
"My dear," she said, "I hope you will make him a good wife."

It was not very encouraging, but Lizzie made the best of it. It was her
desire to cheat Lady Fawn into a good opinion, and she was not
disappointed when no good opinion was expressed at once. It is seldom that
a bad person expects to be accounted good. It is the general desire of
such a one to conquer the existing evil impression; but it is generally
presumed that the evil impression is there. "Oh, Lady Fawn!" she said, "I
will so strive to make him happy. What is it that he likes? What would he
wish me to do and to be? You know his noble nature, and I must look to you
for guidance."

Lady Fawn was embarrassed. She had now seated herself on the sofa, and
Lizzie was close to her, almost enveloped within her mantle. "My dear,"
said Lady Fawn, "if you will endeavour to do your duty by him, I am sure
he will do his by you."

"I know it. I am sure of it. And I will; I will. You will let me love you,
and call you mother?" A peculiar perfume came up from Lizzie's hair which
Lady Fawn did not like. Her own girls, perhaps, were not given to the use
of much perfumery. She shifted her seat a little, and Lizzie was compelled
to sit upright, and without support. Hitherto Lady Fawn had said very
little, and Lizzie's part was one difficult to play. She had heard of that
sermon read every Sunday evening at Fawn Court, and she believed that Lady
Fawn was peculiarly religious. "There," she said, stretching out her hand
backwards and clasping the book which lay upon the small table; "there,
that shall be my guide. That will teach me how to do my duty by my noble
husband."

Lady Fawn in some surprise took the book from Lizzie's hand, and found
that it was the Bible. "You certainly can't do better, my dear, than read
your Bible," said Lady Fawn; but there was more of censure than of eulogy
in the tone of her voice. She put the Bible down very quietly, and asked
Lady Eustace when it would suit her to come down to Fawn Court. Lady Fawn
had promised her son to give the invitation, and could not now, she
thought, avoid giving it.

"Oh, I should like it so much!" said Lizzie. "Whenever it will suit you, I
will be there at a minute's notice." It was then arranged that she should
be at Fawn Court on that day week, and stay for a fortnight. "Of all
things that which I most desire now," said Lizzie, "is to know you and the
dear girls, and to be loved by you all."

Lady Eustace, as soon as she was alone in the room, stood in the middle of
it, scowling--for she could scowl. "I'll not go near them," she said to
herself; "nasty, stupid, dull, puritanical drones. If he don't like it, he
may lump it. After all, it's no such great catch." Then she sat down to
reflect whether it was or was not a catch. As soon as ever Lord Fawn had
left her after the engagement was made, she had begun to tell herself that
he was a poor creature, and that she had done wrong. "Only five thousand a
year!" she said to herself; for she had not perfectly understood that
little explanation which he had given respecting his income. "It's nothing
for a lord." And now again she murmured to herself, "It's my money he's
after. He'll find out that I know how to keep what I have got in my own
hands."

Now that Lady Fawn had been cold to her, she thought still less of the
proposed marriage. But there was this inducement for her to go on with it.
If they, the Fawn women, thought that they could break it off, she would
let them know that they had no such power.

"Well, mamma, you've seen her?" said Mrs. Hittaway.

"Yes, my dear; I've seen her. I had seen her two or three times before,
you know."

"And you are still in love with her?"

"I never said that I was in love with her, Clara."

"And what has been fixed?"

"She is to come down to Fawn Court next week, and stay a fortnight with
us. Then we shall find out what she is."

"That will be best, mamma," said Augusta.

"Mind, mamma; you understand me. I shall tell Frederic plainly just what I
think. Of course he will be offended, and if the marriage goes on, the
offence will remain--till he finds out the truth."

"I hope he'll find out no such truth," said Lady Fawn. She was, however,
quite unable to say a word in behalf of her future daughter-in-law. She
said nothing as to that little scene with the Bible, but she never forgot
it.




CHAPTER X

LIZZIE AND HER LOVER


During the remainder of that Monday and all the Tuesday, Lizzie's mind
was, upon the whole, averse to matrimony. She had told Miss Macnulty of
her prospects, with some amount of exultation; and the poor dependent,
though she knew that she must be turned out into the street, had
congratulated her patroness. "The vulturess will take you in again, when
she knows you've nowhere else to go to," Lizzie had said, displaying
indeed some accurate discernment of her aunt's character. But after Lady
Fawn's visit she spoke of the marriage in a different tone. "Of course, my
dear, I shall have to look very close after the settlement."

"I suppose the lawyers will do that," said Miss Macnulty.

"Yes; lawyers! That's all very well. I know what lawyers are. I'm not
going to trust any lawyer to give away my property. Of course we shall
live at Portray, because his place is in Ireland, and nothing shall take
me to Ireland. I told him that from the very first. But I don't mean to
give up my own income. I don't suppose he'll venture to suggest such a
thing." And then again she grumbled. "It's all very well being in the
Cabinet----!"

"Is Lord Fawn in the Cabinet?" asked Miss Macnulty, who in such matters
was not altogether ignorant.

"Of course he is," said Lizzie, with an angry gesture. It may seem unjust
to accuse her of being stupidly unacquainted with circumstances, and a
liar at the same time; but she was both. She said that Lord Fawn was in
the Cabinet because she had heard some one speak of him as not being a
Cabinet Minister, and in so speaking appear to slight his political
position. Lizzie did not know how much her companion knew, and Miss
Macnulty did not comprehend the depth of the ignorance of her patroness.
Thus the lies which Lizzie told were amazing to Miss Macnulty. To say that
Lord Fawn was in the Cabinet, when all the world knew that he was an
Under-Secretary! What good could a woman get from an assertion so plainly,
so manifestly false? But Lizzie knew nothing of Under-Secretaries. Lord
Fawn was a lord, and even commoners were in the Cabinet. "Of course he
is," said Lizzie; "but I sha'n't have my drawing-room made a Cabinet. They
sha'n't come here." And then again on the Tuesday evening she displayed
her independence. "As for those women down at Richmond, I don't mean to be
overrun by them, I can tell you. I said I would go there, and of course I
shall keep my word."

"I think you had better go," said Miss Macnulty.

"Of course, I shall go. I don't want anybody to tell me where I'm to go,
my dear, and where I'm not. But it'll be about the first and the last. And
as for bringing those dowdy girls out in London, it's the last thing I
shall think of doing. Indeed, I doubt whether they can afford to dress
themselves." As she went up to bed on the Tuesday evening, Miss Macnulty
doubted whether the match would go on. She never believed her friend's
statements; but if spoken words might be supposed to mean anything, Lady
Eustace's words on that Tuesday betokened a strong dislike to everything
appertaining to the Fawn family. She had even ridiculed Lord Fawn himself,
declaring that he understood nothing about anything beyond his office.

And, in truth, Lizzie had almost made up her mind to break it off. All
that she would gain did not seem to weigh down with sufficient
preponderance all that she would lose. Such were her feelings on the
Tuesday night. But on the Wednesday morning she received a note which
threw her back violently upon the Fawn interest. The note was as follows:

"Messrs. Camperdown and Son present their compliments to Lady Eustace.
They have received instructions to proceed by law for the recovery of the
Eustace diamonds, now in Lady Eustace's hands, and will feel obliged to
Lady Eustace if she will communicate to them the name and address of her
attorney.

"62 NEW SQUARE, 30 MAY, 186-."

The effect of this note was to drive Lizzie back upon the Fawn interest.
She was frightened about the diamonds, and was, nevertheless, almost
determined not to surrender them. At any rate, in such a strait she would
want assistance, either in keeping them or in giving them up. The lawyer's
letter afflicted her with a sense of weakness, and there was strength in
the Fawn connection. As Lord Fawn was so poor, perhaps he would adhere to
the jewels. She knew that she could not fight Mr. Camperdown with no other
assistance than what Messrs. Mowbray & Mopus might give her, and therefore
her heart softened toward her betrothed. "I suppose Frederic will be here
to-day," she said to Miss Macnulty, as they sat at breakfast together
about noon. Miss Macnulty nodded. "You can have a cab, you know, if you
like to go anywhere." Miss Macnulty said she thought she would go to the
National Gallery. "And you can walk back, you know," said Lizzie.

"I can walk there and back, too," said Miss Macnulty, in regard to whom it
may be said that the last ounce would sometimes almost break the horse's
back.

"Frederic" came, and was received very graciously. Lizzie had placed Mr.
Camperdown's note on the little table behind her, beneath the Bible, so
that she might put her hand upon it at once if she could make an
opportunity of showing it to her future husband. "Frederic" sat himself
beside her, and the intercourse for a while was such as might be looked
for between two lovers of whom one was a widow and the other an
Undersecretary of State from the India Office. They were loving, but
discreetly amatory, talking chiefly of things material, each flattering
the other, and each hinting now and again at certain little circumstances
of which a more accurate knowledge seemed to be desirable. The one was
conversant with things in general, but was slow; the other was quick as a
lizard in turning hither and thither, but knew almost nothing. When she
told Lord Fawn that the Ayrshire estate was "her own, to do what she liked
with," she did not know that he would certainly find out the truth from
other sources before he married her. Indeed, she was not quite sure
herself whether the statement was true or false, though she would not have
made it so frequently had her idea of the truth been a fixed idea. It had
all been explained to her; but there had been something about a second
son, and there was no second son. Perhaps she might have a second son yet,
a future little Lord Fawn, and he might inherit it. In regard to honesty,
the man was superior to the woman, because his purpose was declared, and
he told no lies; but the one was as mercenary as the other. It was not
love that had brought Lord Fawn to Mount Street.

"What is the name of your place in Ireland?" she asked.

"There is no house, you know."

"But there was one, Frederic?"

"The town-land where the house used to be is called Killeagent. The old
demesne is called Killaud."

"What pretty names! and--and--does it go a great many miles?" Lord Fawn
explained that it did run a good many miles up into the mountains. "How
beautifully romantic!" said Lizzie. "But the people live on the mountain
and pay rent?"

Lord Fawn asked no such inept questions respecting the Ayrshire property,
but he did inquire who was Lizzie's solicitor. "Of course there will be
things to be settled," he said, "and my lawyer had better see yours. Mr.
Camperdown is a----"

"Mr. Camperdown!" almost shrieked Lizzie. Lord Fawn then explained, with
some amazement, that Mr. Camperdown was his lawyer. As far as his belief
went, there was not a more respectable gentleman in the profession. Then
he inquired whether Lizzie had any objection to Mr. Camperdown. "Mr.
Camperdown was Sir Florian's lawyer," said Lizzie.

"That will make it all the easier, I should think," said Lord Fawn.

"I don't know how that may be," said Lizzie, trying to bring her mind to
work upon the subject steadily. "Mr. Camperdown has been very uncourteous
to me; I must say that; and, as I think, unfair. He wishes to rob me now
of a thing that is quite my own."

"What sort of a thing?" asked Lord Fawn slowly.

"A very valuable thing. I'll tell you all about it, Frederic. Of course
I'll tell you everything now. I never could keep back anything from one
that I loved. It's not my nature. There; you might as well read that
note." Then she put her hand back and brought Mr. Camperdown's letter from
under the Bible. Lord Fawn read it very attentively, and as he read it
there came upon him a great doubt. What sort of woman was this to whom he
had engaged himself because she was possessed of an income? That Mr.
Camperdown should be in the wrong in such a matter was an idea which never
occurred to Lord Fawn. There is no form of belief stronger than that which
the ordinary English gentleman has in the discretion and honesty of his
own family lawyer. What his lawyer tells him to do he does. What his
lawyer tells him to sign he signs. He buys and sells in obedience to the
same direction, and feels perfectly comfortable in the possession of a
guide who is responsible and all but divine.

"What diamonds are they?" asked Lord Fawn in a very low voice.

"They are my own--altogether my own. Sir Florian gave them to me. When he
put them into my hands he said that they were to be my own for ever and
ever. 'There,' said he, 'those are yours to do what you choose with them.'
After that they oughtn't to ask me to give them back, ought they? If you
had been married before, and your wife had given you a keepsake, to keep
for ever and ever, would you give it up to a lawyer? You would not like
it, would you, Frederic?" She had put her hand on his and was looking up
into his face as she asked the question. Again, perhaps, the acting was a
little overdone; but there were the tears in her eyes, and the tone of her
voice was perfect.

"Mr. Camperdown calls them Eustace diamonds--family diamonds," said Lord
Fawn. "What do they consist of? What are they worth?"

"I'll show them to you," said Lizzie, jumping up and hurrying out of the
room. Lord Fawn, when he was alone, rubbed his hands over his eyes and
thought about it all. It would be a very harsh measure on the part of the
Eustace family and of Mr. Camperdown to demand from her the surrender of
any trinket which her late husband might have given her in the manner she
had described. But it was, to his thinking, most improbable that the
Eustace people or the lawyer should be harsh to a widow bearing the
Eustace name. The Eustaces were by disposition lavish, and old Mr.
Camperdown was not one who would be strict in claiming little things for
rich clients. And yet here was his letter, threatening the widow of the
late baronet with legal proceedings for the recovery of jewels which had
been given by Sir Florian himself to his wife as a keepsake! Perhaps Sir
Florian had made some mistake, and had caused to be set in a ring or
brooch for his bride some jewel which he had thought to be his own, but
which had, in truth, been an heirloom. If so, the jewel should, of course,
be surrendered, or replaced by one of equal value. He was making out some
such solution, when Lizzie returned with the morocco case in her hand. "It
was the manner in which he gave it to me," said Lizzie, as she opened the
clasp, "which makes its value to me."

Lord Fawn knew nothing about jewels, but even he knew that if the circle
of stones which he saw, with a Maltese cross appended to it, was
constituted of real diamonds, the thing must be of great value. And it
occurred to him at once that such a necklace is not given by a husband
even to a bride in the manner described by Lizzie. A ring, or brooch, or
perhaps a bracelet, a lover or a loving lord may bring in his pocket. But
such an ornament as this on which Lord Fawn was now looking is given in
another sort of way. He felt sure that it was so, even though he was
entirely ignorant of the value of the stones. "Do you know what it is
worth?" he asked.

Lizzie hesitated a moment and then remembered that "Frederic," in his
present position in regard to herself, might be glad to assist her in
maintaining the possession of a substantial property. "I think they say
its value is about--ten thousand pounds," she replied.

"Ten--thousand--pounds!" Lord Fawn riveted his eyes upon them.

"That's what I am told--by a jeweller."

"By what jeweller?"

"A man had to come and see them, about some repairs, or something of that
kind. Poor Sir Florian wished it. And he said so."

"What was the man's name?"

"I forget his name," said Lizzie, who was not quite sure whether her
acquaintance with Mr. Benjamin would be considered respectable.

"Ten thousand pounds! You don't keep them in the house, do you?"

"I have an iron case up-stairs for them, ever so heavy."

"And did Sir Florian give you the iron case?" Lizzie hesitated for a
moment. "Yes," said she. "That is--no. But he ordered it to be made; and
then it came, after he was--dead."

"He knew their value, then."

"Oh dear, yes. Though he never named any sum. He told me, however, that
they were very--very valuable."

Lord Fawn did not immediately recognise the falseness of every word that
the woman said to him, because he was slow and could not think and hear at
the same time. But he was at once involved in a painful maze of doubt and
almost of dismay. An action for the recovery of jewels brought against the
lady whom he was engaged to marry, on behalf of the family of her late
husband, would not suit him at all. To have his hands quite clean, to be
above all evil report, to be respectable, as it were, all round, was Lord
Fawn's special ambition. He was a poor man, and a greedy man, but he would
have abandoned his official salary at a moment's notice, rather than there
should have fallen on him a breath of public opinion hinting that it ought
to be abandoned. He was especially timid, and lived in a perpetual fear
least the newspapers should say something hard of him. In that matter of
the Sawab he had been very wretched, because Frank Greystock had accused
him of being an administrator of tyranny. He would have liked his wife to
have ten thousand pounds' worth of diamonds very well; but he would rather
go without a wife forever--and without a wife's fortune--than marry a
woman subject to an action for claiming diamonds not her own. "I think,"
said he at last, "that if you were to put them into Mr. Camperdown's
hands--"

"Into Mr. Camperdown's hands!"

"And then let the matter be settled by arbitration----"

"Arbitration? That means going to law?"

"No, dearest; that means not going to law. The diamonds would be intrusted
to Mr. Camperdown; and then some one would be appointed to decide whose
property they were."

"They're my property," said Lizzie.

"But he says they belong to the family."

"He'll say anything," said Lizzie.

"My dearest girl, there can't be a more respectable man than Mr.
Camperdown. You must do something of the kind, you know."

"I sha'n't do anything of the kind," said Lizzie. "Sir Florian Eustace
gave them to me, and I shall keep them." She did not look at her lover as
she spoke; but he looked at her, and did not like the change which he saw
on her countenance. And he did not like the circumstances in which he
found himself placed. "Why should Mr. Camperdown interfere?" continued
Lizzie. "If they don't belong to me, they belong to my son; and who has so
good a right to keep them for him as I have? But they belong to me."

"They should not be kept in a private house like this at all, if they are
worth all that money."

"If I were to let them go, Mr. Camperdown would get them. There's nothing
he wouldn't do to get them. Oh, Frederic, I hope you'll stand to me, and
not see me injured. Of course I only want them for my darling child."

Frederic's face had become very long, and he was much disturbed in his
mind. He could only suggest that he himself would go and see Mr.
Camperdown and ascertain what ought to be done. To the last he adhered to
his assurance that Mr. Camperdown could do no evil; till Lizzie, in her
wrath, asked him whether he believed Mr. Camperdown's word before hers. "I
think he would understand a matter of business better than you," said the
prudent lover.

"He wants to rob me," said Lizzie, "and I shall look to you to prevent
it."

When Lord Fawn took his leave, which he did not do till he had counselled
her again and again to leave the matter in Mr. Camperdown's hands, the two
were not in good accord together. It was his fixed purpose, as he declared
to her, to see Mr. Camperdown; and it was her fixed purpose, so at least
she declared to him, to keep the diamonds, in spite of Mr. Camperdown.
"But, my dear, if it's decided against you," said Lord Fawn gravely.

"It can't be decided against me, if you stand by me as you ought to do."

"I can do nothing," said Lord Fawn, in a tremor. Then Lizzie looked at
him, and her look, which was very eloquent, called him a poltroon as plain
as a look could speak. Then they parted, and the signs of affection
between them were not satisfactory.

The door was hardly closed behind him before Lizzie began to declare to
herself that he shouldn't escape her. It was not yet twenty-four hours
since she had been telling herself that she did not like the engagement
and would break it off; and now she was stamping her little feet, and
clenching her little hands, and swearing to herself by all her gods that
this wretched, timid lordling should not get out of her net. She did, in
truth, despise him because he would not clutch the jewels. She looked upon
him as mean and paltry because he was willing to submit to Mr. Camperdown.
But, yet, she was prompted to demand all that could be demanded from her
engagement, because she thought that she perceived a something in him
which might produce in him a desire to be relieved from it. No! He should
not be relieved. He should marry her. And she would keep the key of that
iron box with the diamonds, and he should find what sort of a noise she
would make if he attempted to take it from her. She closed the morocco
case, ascended with it to her bedroom, locked it up in the iron safe,
deposited the little patent key in its usual place round her neck, and
then seated herself at her desk, and wrote letters to her various friends,
making known to them her engagement. Hitherto she had told no one but Miss
Macnulty, and, in her doubts, had gone so far as to desire Miss Macnulty
not to mention it. Now she was resolved to blazon forth her engagement
before all the world.

The first "friend" to whom she wrote was Lady Linlithgow. The reader shall
see two or three of her letters, and that to the countess shall be the
first:

"MY DEAR AUNT: When you came to see me the other day, I cannot say that
you were very kind to me, and I don't suppose you care very much what
becomes of me. But I think it right to let you know that I am going to be
married. I am engaged to Lord Fawn, who, as you know, is a peer, and a
member of Her Majesty's Government, and a nobleman of great influence. I
do not suppose that even you can say anything against such an alliance.

"I am your affectionate niece,

"ELI. EUSTACE."

Then she wrote to Mrs. Eustace, the wife of the Bishop of Bobsborough.
Mrs. Eustace had been very kind to her in the first days of her widowhood,
and had fully recognised her as the widow of the head of her husband's
family. Lizzie had liked none of the Bobsborough people. They were,
according to her ideas, slow, respectable, and dull. But they had not
found much open fault with her, and she was aware that it was for her
interest to remain on good terms with them. Her letter, therefore, to Mrs.
Eustace was somewhat less acrid than that written to her Aunt Linlithgow:

"MY DEAR MRS. EUSTACE: I hope you will be glad to hear from me, and will
not be sorry to hear my news. I am going to be married again. Of course I
am not about to take a step which is in every way so very important
without thinking about it a great deal. But I am sure it will be better
for my darling little Florian in every way; and as for myself, I have felt
for the last two years how unfitted I have been to manage everything
myself. I have therefore accepted an offer made to me by Lord Fawn, who
is, as you know, a peer of Parliament, and a most distinguished member of
Her Majesty's Government; and he is, too, a nobleman of very great
influence in every respect, and has a property in Ireland, extending over
ever so many miles, and running up into the mountains. His mansion there
is called Killmage, but I am not sure that I remember the name quite
rightly. I hope I may see you there some day, and the dear bishop. I look
forward with delight to doing something to make those dear Irish happier.
The idea of rambling up into our own mountains charms me, for nothing
suits my disposition so well as that kind of solitude.

"Of course Lord Fawn is not so rich a man as Sir Florian, but I have never
looked to riches for my happiness. Not but what Lord Fawn has a good
income from his Irish estates; and then, of course, he is paid for doing
Her Majesty's Government; so there is no fear that he will have to live
upon my jointure, which, of course, would not be right. Pray tell the dear
bishop and dear Margaretta all this, with my love. You will be happy, I
know, to hear that my little Flo is quite well. He is already so fond of
his new papa!" [Lizzie's turn for lying was exemplified in this last
statement, for, as it happened, Lord Fawn had never yet seen the child.]

"Believe me to be always

"Your most affectionate niece,

"ELI. EUSTACE."

There were two other letters--one to her uncle, the dean, and the other to
her cousin Frank. There was great doubt in her mind as to the expediency
of writing to Frank Greystock; but at last she decided that she would do
it. The letter to the dean need not be given in full, as it was very
similar to that written to the bishop's wife. The same mention was made of
her intended husband's peerage, and the same allusion to Her Majesty's
Government--a phrase which she had heard from Lord Fawn himself. She spoke
of the Irish property, but in terms less glowing than she had used in
writing to the lady, and ended by asking for her uncle's congratulation--
and blessing. Her letter to Frank was as follows, and, doubtless, as she
wrote it, there was present to her mind a remembrance of the fact that he
himself might have offered to her, and have had her if he would:

"MY DEAR COUSIN: As I would rather that you should hear my news from
myself than from any one else, I write to tell you that I am going to be
married to Lord Fawn. Of course I know that there are certain matters as
to which you and Lord Fawn do not agree--in politics, I mean; but still I
do not doubt but you will think that he is quite able to take care of your
poor little cousin. It was only settled a day or two since, but it has
been coming on ever so long. You understand all about that, don't you? Of
course you must come to my wedding, and be very good to me--a kind of
brother, you know; for we have always been friends, haven't we? And if the
dean doesn't come up to town, you must give me away. And you must come and
see me ever so often; for I have a sort of feeling that I have no one else
belonging to me that I can call really my own, except you. And you must be
great friends with Lord Fawn, and must give up saying that he doesn't do
his work properly. Of course he does everything better than anybody else
could possibly do it, except Cousin Frank.

"I am going down next week to Richmond. Lady Fawn has insisted on my
staying there for a fortnight. Oh dear, what shall I do all the time? You
must positively come down and see me, and see somebody else too. Only you,
naughty coz, you mustn't break a poor girl's heart.

"Your affectionate cousin,

"ELI. EUSTACE."

Somebody, in speaking on Lady Eustace's behalf, and making the best of her
virtues, had declared that she did not have lovers. Hitherto that had been
true of her; but her mind had not the less dwelt on the delight of a
lover. She still thought of a possible Corsair who would be willing to
give up all but his vices for her love, and for whose sake she would be
willing to share even them. It was but a dream, but nevertheless it
pervaded her fancy constantly. Lord Fawn, peer of Parliament, and member
of Her Majesty's Government, as he was, could not have been such a lover
to her. Might it not be possible that there should exist something of
romance between her and her cousin Frank? She was the last woman in the
world to run away with a man, or to endanger her position by a serious
indiscretion; but there might perhaps be a something between her and her
cousin, a liaison quite correct in its facts, a secret understanding, if
nothing more, a mutual sympathy, which should be chiefly shown in the
abuse of all their friends; and in this she could indulge her passion for
romance and poetry.




CHAPTER XI

LORD FAWN AT HIS OFFICE


The news was soon all about London, as Lizzie had intended. She had made a
sudden resolve that Lord Fawn should not escape her, and she had gone to
work after the fashion we have seen. Frank Greystock had told John
Eustace, and John Eustace had told Mr. Camperdown before Lord Fawn
himself, in the slow prosecution of his purpose, had consulted the lawyer
about the necklace. "God bless my soul; Lord Fawn!" the old lawyer had
said when the news was communicated to him. "Well, yes; he wants money. I
don't envy him; that's all. We shall get the diamonds now, John. Lord Fawn
isn't the man to let his wife keep what doesn't belong to her." Then,
after a day or two, Lord Fawn had himself gone to Mr. Camperdown's
chambers. "I believe I am to congratulate you, my lord," said the lawyer.
"I'm told you are going to marry--well, I mustn't really say another of my
clients, but the widow of one of them. Lady Eustace is a very beautiful
woman, and she has a very pretty income too. She has the whole of the
Scotch property for her life."

"It's only for her life, I suppose?" said Lord Fawn.

"Oh, no, no; of course not. There's been some mistake on her part; at
least, so I've been told. Women never understand. It's all as clear as
daylight. Had there been a second son, the second son would have had it.
As it is, it goes with the rest of the property, just as it ought to do,
you know. Four thousand a year isn't so bad, you know, considering that
she isn't more than a girl yet, and that she hadn't sixpence of her own.
When the admiral died, there wasn't sixpence, Lord Fawn."

"So I have heard."

"Not sixpence. It's all Eustace money. She had six or eight thousand
pounds, or something like that, besides. She's as lovely a young widow as
I ever saw, and very clever."

"Yes, she is clever."

"By-the-by, Lord Fawn, as you have done me the honour of calling, there's
a stupid mistake about some family diamonds."

"It is in respect to them that I've come," said Lord Fawn. Then Mr.
Camperdown, in his easy, off-hand way, imputing no blame to the lady in
the hearing of her future husband, and declaring his opinion that she was
doubtless unaware of its value, explained the matter of the necklace. Lord
Fawn listened, but said very little. He especially did not say that Lady
Eustace had had the stones valued. "They're real, I suppose?" he asked.
Mr. Camperdown assured him that no diamonds more real had ever come from
Golconda, or passed through Mr. Garnett's hands.

"They are as well known as any family diamonds in England," said Mr.
Camperdown. "She has got into bad hands," continued Mr. Camperdown.
"Mowbray & Mopus; horrible people; sharks, that make one blush for one's
profession, and I was really afraid there would have been trouble. But, of
course, it'll be all right now; and if she'll only come to me, tell her
I'll do everything I can to make things straight and comfortable for her.
If she likes to have another lawyer, of course, that's all right. Only
make her understand who Mowbray & Mopus are. It's quite out of the
question, Lord Fawn, that your wife should have anything to do with
Mowbray & Mopus." Every word that Mr. Camperdown said was gospel to Lord
Fawn.

And yet, as the reader will understand, Mr. Camperdown had by no means
expressed his real opinion in this interview. He had spoken of the widow
in friendly terms, declaring that she was simply mistaken in her ideas as
to the duration of her interest in the Scotch property, and mistaken again
about the diamonds; whereas in truth he regarded her as a dishonest,
lying, evil-minded harpy. Had Lord Fawn consulted him simply as a client,
and not have come to him an engaged lover, he would have expressed his
opinion quite frankly; but it is not the business of a lawyer to tell his
client evil things of the lady whom that client is engaged to marry. In
regard to the property he spoke the truth, and he spoke what he believed
to be the truth when he said that the whole thing would no doubt now be
easily arranged. When Lord Fawn took his leave, Mr. Camperdown again
declared to himself that as regarded money the match was very well for his
lordship; but that, as regarded the woman, Lizzie was dear at the price.
"Perhaps he doesn't mind it," said Mr. Camperdown to himself, "but I
wouldn't marry such a woman myself, though she owned all Scotland."

There had been much in the interview to make Lord Fawn unhappy. In the
first place, that golden hope as to the perpetuity of the property was at
an end. He had never believed that it was so; but a man may hope without
believing. And he was quite sure that Lizzie was bound to give up the
diamonds, and would ultimately be made to give them up. Of any property in
them, as possibly accruing to himself, he had not thought much; but he
could not abstain from thinking of the woman's grasp upon them. Mr.
Camperdown's plain statement, which was gospel to him, was directly at
variance with Lizzie's story. Sir Florian certainly would not have given
such diamonds in such a way. Sir Florian would not have ordered a separate
iron safe for them, with a view that they might be secure in his wife's
bedroom. And then she had had them valued, and manifestly was always
thinking of her treasure. It was very well for a poor, careful peer to be
always thinking of his money, but Lord Fawn was well aware that a young
woman such as Lady Eustace should have her thoughts elsewhere. As he sat
signing letters at the India Board, relieving himself when he was left
alone between each batch by standing up with his back to the fireplace,
his mind was full of all this. He could not unravel truth quickly, but he
could grasp it when it came to him. She was certainly greedy, false, and
dishonest. And--worse than all this--she had dared to tell him to his face
that he was a poor creature because he would not support her in her greed,
and falsehood, and dishonesty! Nevertheless, he was engaged to marry her!
Then he thought of one Violet Effingham whom he had loved, and then came
over him some suspicion of a fear that he himself was hard and selfish.
And yet what was such a one as he to do? It was of course necessary for
the maintenance of the very constitution of his country that there should
be future Lord Fawns. There could be no future Lord Fawns unless he
married; and how could he marry without money? "A peasant can marry whom
he pleases," said Lord Fawn, pressing his hand to his brow, and dropping
one flap of his coat, as he thought of his own high and perilous destiny,
standing with his back to the fireplace, while a huge pile of letters lay
there before him waiting to be signed.

It was a Saturday evening, and as there was no House there was nothing to
hurry him away from the office. He was the occupier for the time of a
large, well-furnished official room, looking out into St. James's Park;
and as he glanced round it he told himself that his own happiness must be
there, and not in the domesticity of a quiet home. The House of Lords, out
of which nobody could turn him, and official life--as long as he could
hold to it--must be all in all to him. He had engaged himself to this
woman, and he must--marry her. He did not think that he could now see any
way of avoiding that event. Her income would supply the needs of her home,
and then there might probably be a continuation of Lord Fawns. The world
might have done better for him--had he been able to find favour in Violet
Effingham's sight. He was a man capable of love, and very capable of
constancy to a woman true to him. Then he wiped away a tear as he sat down
to sign the huge batch of letters. As he read some special letter in which
instructions were conveyed as to the insufficiency of the Sawab's claims,
he thought of Frank Greystock's attack upon him, and of Frank Greystock's
cousin. There had been a time in which he had feared that the two cousins
would become man and wife. At this moment he uttered a malediction against
the member for Bobsborough, which might perhaps have been spared had the
member been now willing to take the lady off his hands. Then the door was
opened, and the messenger told him that Mrs. Hittaway was in the waiting-
room. Mrs. Hittaway was, of course, at once made welcome to the Under-
Secretary's own apartment.

Mrs. Hittaway was a strong-minded woman--the strongest-minded probably of
the Fawn family--but she had now come upon a task which taxed all her
strength to the utmost. She had told her mother that she would tell
"Frederic" what she thought about his proposed bride, and she had now come
to carry out her threat. She had asked her brother to come and dine with
her, but he had declined. His engagements hardly admitted of his dining
with his relatives. She had called upon him at the rooms he occupied in
Victoria Street, but of course she had not found him. She could not very
well go to his club; so now she had hunted him down at his office. From
the very commencement of the interview Mrs. Hittaway was strong-minded.
She began the subject of the marriage, and did so without a word of
congratulation. "Dear Frederic," she said, "you know that we have all got
to look up to you."

"Well, Clara, what does that mean?"

"It means this--that you must bear with me, if I am more anxious as to
your future career than another sister might be."

"Now I know you are going to say something unpleasant."

"Yes, I am, Frederic. I have heard so many bad things about Lady Eustace!"

The Under-Secretary sat silent for a while in his great armchair. "What
sort of evil things do you mean, Clara?" he asked at last. "Evil things
are said of a great many people--as you know. I am sure you would not wish
to repeat slanders."

Mrs. Hittaway was not to be silenced after this fashion. "Not slanders,
certainly, Frederic. But when I hear that you intend to raise this lady to
the rank and position of your wife, then of course the truth or falsehood
of these reports becomes a matter of great moment to us all. Don't you
think you had better see Mr. Camperdown?"

"I have seen him."

"And what does he say?"

"What should he say? Lady Eustace has, I believe, made some mistake about
the condition of her property, and people who have heard it have been
good-natured enough to say that the error has been wilful. That is what I
call slander, Clara."

"And you have heard about her jewels?" Mrs. Hittaway was alluding here to
the report which had reached her as to Lizzie's debt to Harter & Benjamin
when she married Sir Florian; but Lord Fawn of course thought of the
diamond necklace.

"Yes," said he, "I have heard all about them. Who told you?"

"I have known it ever so long. Sir Florian never got over it." Lord Fawn
was again in the dark, but he did not choose to commit himself by asking
further questions. "And then her treatment of Lady Linlithgow, who was her
only friend before she married, was something quite unnatural. Ask the
dean's people what they think of her. I believe even they would tell you."

"Frank Greystock desired to marry her himself."

"Yes, for her money, perhaps; because he has not got a farthing in the
world. Dear Frederic, I only wish to put you on your guard. Of course this
is very unpleasant, and I shouldn't do it if I didn't think it my duty. I
believe she is artful and very false. She certainly deceived Sir Florian
Eustace about her debts; and he never held up his head after he found out
what she was. If she told you falsehoods, of course you can break it off.
Dear Frederic, I hope you won't be angry with me."

"Is that all?" he asked.

"Yes, that is all."

"I'll bear it in mind," he said. "Of course it isn't very pleasant."

"No, I know it is not pleasant," said Mrs. Hittaway, rising, and taking
her departure with an offer of affectionate sisterly greeting, which was
not accepted with cordiality.

It was very unpleasant. That very morning Lord Fawn had received letters
from the Dean and the Bishop of Bobsborough congratulating him on his
intended marriage, both those worthy dignitaries of the Church having
thought it expedient to verify Lizzie's statements. Lord Fawn was,
therefore, well aware that Lady Eustace had published the engagement. It
was known to everybody, and could not be broken off without public
scandal.




CHAPTER XII

I ONLY THOUGHT OF IT


There was great perturbation down at Fawn Court. On the day fixed, Monday,
June 5, Lizzie arrived. Nothing further had been said by Lady Fawn to urge
the invitation; but, in accordance with the arrangement already made, Lady
Eustace, with her child, her nurse, and her own maid, was at Fawn Court by
four o'clock. A very long letter had been received from Mrs. Hittaway that
morning, the writing of which must have seriously interfered with the
tranquillity of her Sunday afternoon. Lord Fawn did not make his
appearance at Richmond on the Saturday evening, nor was he seen on the
Sunday. That Sunday was, we may presume, chiefly devoted to reflection. He
certainly did not call upon his future wife. His omission to do so, no
doubt, increased Lizzie's urgency in the matter of her visit to Richmond.
Frank Greystock had written to congratulate her. "Dear Frank," she had
said in reply, "a woman situated as I am has so many things to think of.
Lord Fawn's position will be of service to my child. Mind you come and see
me at Fawn Court. I count so, much on your friendship and assistance."

Of course she was expected at Richmond, although throughout the morning
Lady Fawn had entertained almost a hope that she wouldn't come. "He was
only lukewarm in defending her," Mrs. Hittaway had said in her letter,
"and I still think that there may be an escape." Not even a note had come
from Lord Fawn himself, nor from Lady Eustace. Possibly something violent
might have been done, and Lady Eustace would not appear. But Lady Eustace
did appear, and, after a fashion, was made welcome at Fawn Court.

The Fawn ladies were not good hypocrites. Lady Fawn had said almost
nothing to her daughters of her visit to Mount Street, but Augusta had
heard the discussion in Mrs. Hittaway's drawing-room as to the character
of the future bride. The coming visit had been spoken of almost with awe,
and there was a general conviction in the dovecote that an evil thing had
fallen upon them. Consequently, their affection to the newcomer, though
spoken in words, was not made evident by signs and manners. Lizzie herself
took care that the position in which she was received should be
sufficiently declared. "It seems so odd that I am to come among you as a
sister," she said. The girls were forced to assent to the claim, but they
assented coldly. "He has told me to attach myself especially to you," she
whispered to Augusta. The unfortunate chosen one, who had but little
strength of her own, accepted the position, and then, as the only means of
escaping the embraces of her newly-found sister, pleaded the violence of a
headache. "My mother," said Lizzie to Lady Fawn.

"Yes, my dear," said Lady Fawn. "One of the girls had perhaps better go up
and show you your room.--I am very much afraid about it," said Lady Fawn
to her daughter Amelia. Amelia replied only by shaking her head.

On the Tuesday morning there came a note from Lord Fawn to his lady love.
Of course the letter was not shown, but Lizzie received it at the
breakfast table, and read it with many little smiles and signs of
satisfaction. And then she gave out various little statements as having
been made in that letter. He says this, and he says that, and he is coming
here, and going there, and he will do one thing, and he won't do the
other. We have often seen young ladies crowing over their lovers' letters,
and it was pleasant to see Lizzie crowing over hers. And yet there was but
very little in the letter. Lord Fawn told her that what with the House and
what with the Office, he could not get down to Richmond before Saturday;
but that on Saturday he would come. Then he signed himself "Yours
affectionately, Fawn." Lizzie did her crowing very prettily. The outward
show of it was there to perfection, so that the Fawn girls really believed
that their brother had written an affectionate lover's letter. Inwardly
Lizzie swore to herself, as she read the cold words with indignation, that
the man should not escape her.

The days went by very tediously. On the Wednesday and the Friday Lady
Eustace made an excuse of going up to town, and insisted on taking the
unfortunate Augusta with her. There was no real reason for these journeys
to London, unless that glance which on each occasion was given to the
contents of the iron case was a real reason. The diamonds were safe, and
Miss Macnulty was enjoying herself. On the Friday Lizzie proposed to
Augusta that they should jointly make a raid upon the member of Her
Majesty's Government at his office; but Augusta positively refused to take
such a step. "I know he would be angry," pleaded Augusta.

"Pshaw! who cares for his anger?" said Lizzie. But the visit was not made.

On the Saturday--the Saturday which was to bring Lord Fawn down to dinner
--another most unexpected visitor made his appearance. At about three
o'clock Frank Greystock was at Fawn Court. Now it was certainly understood
that Mr. Greystock had been told not to come to Fawn Court as long as Lucy
Morris was there. "Dear Mr. Greystock, I'm sure you will take what I say
as I mean it," Lady Fawn had whispered to him. "You know how attached we
all are to our dear little Lucy. Perhaps you know----." There had been
more of it; but the meaning of it all was undoubtedly this, that Frank was
not to pay visits to Lucy Morris at Fawn Court. Now he had come to see his
cousin Lizzie Eustace.

On this occasion Lady Fawn, with Amelia and two of the other girls, were
out in the carriage. The unfortunate Augusta had been left at home with
her bosom friend; while Cecilia and Nina were supposed to be talking
French with Lucy Morris. They were all out in the grounds, sitting upon
the benches, and rambling among the shrubberies, when of a sudden Frank
Greystock was in the midst of them. Lizzie's expression of joy at seeing
her cousin was almost as great as though he had been in fact a brother.
She ran up to him and grasped his hand, and hung on his arm, and looked up
into his face, and then burst into tears. But the tears were not violent
tears. There were just three sobs, and two bright eyes full of water, and
a lace handkerchief, and then a smile. "Oh, Frank," she said, "it does
make one think so of old times." Augusta had by this time been almost
persuaded to believe in her--though the belief by no means made the poor
young woman happy. Frank thought that his cousin looked very well, and
said something as to Lord Fawn being "the happiest fellow going." "I hope
I shall make him happy," said Lizzie, clasping her hands together.

Lucy meanwhile was standing in the circle with the others. It never
occurred to her that it was her duty to run away from the man she loved.
She had shaken hands with him, and felt something of affection in his
pressure. She did not believe that his visit was made entirely to his
cousin, and had no idea at the moment of disobeying Lady Fawn. During the
last few days she had been thrown very much with her old friend Lizzie,
and had been treated by the future peeress with many signs of almost
sisterly affection. "Dear Lucy," Lizzie had said, "you can understand me.
These people--oh, they are so good, but they can't understand me." Lucy
had expressed a hope that Lord Fawn understood her. "Oh, Lord Fawn--well,
yes; perhaps--I don't know. It so often happens that one's husband is the
last person to understand one."

"If I thought so, I wouldn't marry him," said Lucy.

"Frank Greystock will understand you," said Lizzie. It was indeed true
that Lucy did understand something of her wealthy friend's character, and
was almost ashamed of the friendship. With Lizzie Greystock she had never
sympathised, and Lizzie Eustace had always been distasteful to her. She
already felt that the less she should see of Lizzie Fawn the better she
should like it.

Before an hour was over Frank Greystock was walking round the shrubberies
with Lucy--and was walking with Lucy alone. It was undoubtedly the fact
that Lady Eustace had contrived that it should be so. The unfitness of the
thing recommended it to her. Frank could hardly marry a wife without a
shilling. Lucy would certainly not think at all of shillings. Frank, as
Lizzie knew, had been almost at her feet within the last fortnight, and
might, in some possible emergency, be there again. In the midst of such
circumstances nothing could be better than that Frank and Lucy should be
thrown together. Lizzie regarded all this as romance. Poor Lady Fawn, had
she known it all, would have called it diabolical wickedness and inhuman
cruelty.

"Well, Lucy, what do you think of it?" Frank Greystock said to her.

"Think of what, Mr. Greystock?"

"You know what I mean--this marriage?"

"How should I be able to think? I have never seen them together. I suppose
Lord Fawn isn't very rich. She is rich. And then she is very beautiful.
Don't you think her very beautiful?"

"Sometimes exquisitely lovely."

"Everybody says so, and I am sure it is the fact. Do you know--but perhaps
you'll think I am envious."

"If I thought you envious of Lizzie, I should have to think you very
foolish at the same time."

"I don't know what that means"--she did know well enough what it meant--
"but sometimes to me she is almost frightful to look at."

"In what way?"

"Oh, I can't tell you. She looks like a beautiful animal that you are
afraid to caress for fear it should bite you--an animal that would be
beautiful if its eyes were not so restless and its teeth so sharp and so
white."

"How very odd."

"Why odd, Mr. Greystock?"

"Because I feel exactly in the same way about her. I am not in the least
afraid that she'll bite me; and as for caressing the animal--that kind of
caressing which you mean--it seems to me to be just what she's made for.
But I do feel sometimes that she is like a cat."

"Something not quite so tame as a cat," said Lucy.

"Nevertheless she is very lovely, and very clever. Sometimes I think her
the most beautiful woman I ever saw in the world."

"Do you, indeed?"

"She will be immensely run after as Lady Fawn. When she pleases she can
make her own house quite charming. I never knew a woman who could say
pretty things to so many people at once."

"You are making her out to be a paragon of perfection, Mr. Greystock."

"And when you add to all the rest that she has four thousand a year, you
must admit that Lord Fawn is a lucky man."

"I have said nothing against it."

"Four thousand a year is a very great consideration, Lucy."

Lucy for a while said nothing. She was making up her mind that she would
say nothing--that she would make no reply indicative of any feeling on her
part. But she was not sufficiently strong to keep her resolution. "I
wonder, Mr. Greystock," she said, "that you did not attempt to win the
great prize yourself. Cousins do marry."

He had thought of attempting it, and at this moment he would not lie to
her. "The cousinship had nothing to do with it," he said.

"Perhaps you did think of it."

"I did, Lucy. Yes, I did. Thank God, I only thought of it." She could not
refrain herself from looking up into his face and clasping her hands
together. A woman never so dearly loves a man as when he confesses that he
has been on the brink of a great crime, but has refrained and has not
committed it. "I did think of it. I am not telling you that she would have
taken me. I have no reason whatever for thinking so."

"I am sure she would," said Lucy, who did not in the least know what words
she was uttering.

"It would have been simply for her money--her money and her beauty. It
would not have been because I love her."

"Never--never ask a girl to marry you unless you love her, Mr. Greystock."

"Then there is only one that I can ever ask," said he. There was nothing,
of course, that she could say to this. If he did not choose to go further,
she was not bound to understand him. But would he go further? She felt at
the moment that an open declaration of his love to herself would make her
happy forever, even though it should be accompanied by an assurance that
he could not marry her. If they only knew each other--that it was so
between them--that, she thought, would be enough for her. And as for him--
if a woman could bear such a position, surely he might bear it. "Do you
know who that one is?" he asked.

"No," she said, shaking her head.

"Lucy, is that true?"

"What does it matter?"

"Lucy; look at me, Lucy," and he put his hand upon her arm.

"No, no, no," she said.

"I love you so well, Lucy, that I never can love another. I have thought
of many women, but could never even think of one as a woman to love except
you. I have sometimes fancied I could marry for money and position, to
help myself on in the world by means of a wife; but when my mind has run
away with me, to revel amidst ideas of feminine sweetness, you have
always--always been the heroine of the tale, as the mistress of the happy
castle in the air."

"Have I?" she asked.

"Always, always. As regards this," and he struck himself on the breast,
"no man was ever more constant. Though I don't think much of myself as a
man, I know a woman when I see her." But he did not ask her to be his
wife; nor did he wait at Fawn Court till Lady Fawn had come back with the
carriage.




CHAPTER XIII

SHOWING WHAT FRANK GREYSTOCK DID


Frank Greystock escaped from the dovecote before Lady Fawn had returned.
He had not made his visit to Richmond with any purpose of seeing Lucy
Morris, or of saying to her when he did see her anything special--of
saying anything that should, or anything that should not, have been said.
He had gone there, in truth, simply because his cousin had asked him, and
because it was almost a duty on his part to see his cousin on the
momentous occasion of this new engagement. But he had declared to himself
that old Lady Fawn was a fool, and that to see Lucy again would be very
pleasant. "See her; of course I'll see her," he had said. "Why should I be
prevented from seeing her?" Now he had seen her, and as he returned by the
train to London, he acknowledged to himself that it was no longer in his
power to promote his fortune by marriage. He had at last said that to Lucy
which made it impossible for him to offer his hand to any other woman. He
had not, in truth, asked her to be his wife; but he had told her that he
loved her, and could never love any other woman. He had asked for no
answer to this assurance, and then he had left her.

In the course of that afternoon he did question himself as to his conduct
to this girl, and subjected himself to some of the rigours of a cross-
examination. He was not a man who could think of a girl as the one human
being whom he loved above all others, and yet look forward with equanimity
to the idea of doing her an injury. He could understand that a man unable
to marry should be reticent as to his feelings, supposing him to have been
weak enough to have succumbed to a passion which could only mar his own
prospects. He was frank enough in owning to himself that he had been thus
weak. The weakness had come upon himself early in life, and was there, an
established fact. The girl was to him unlike any other girl, or any man.
There was to him a sweetness in her companionship which he could not
analyse. She was not beautiful. She had none of the charms of fashion. He
had never seen her well dressed, according to the ideas of dress which he
found to be prevailing in the world. She was a little thing, who, as a
man's wife, could attract no attention by figure, form, or outward manner;
one who had quietly submitted herself to the position of a governess, and
who did not seem to think that in doing so she obtained less than her due.
But yet he knew her to be better than all the rest. For him, at any rate,
she was better than all the rest. Her little hand was cool and sweet to
him. Sometimes, when he was heated and hard at work, he would fancy how it
would be with him if she were by him, and would lay it on his brow. There
was a sparkle in her eye that had to him more of sympathy in it than could
be conveyed by all the other eyes in the world. There was an expression in
her mouth when she smiled which was more eloquent to him than any sound.
There was a reality and a truth about her which came home to him, and made
themselves known to him as firm rocks which could not be shaken. He had
never declared to himself that deceit or hypocrisy in a woman was
especially abominable. As a rule he looked for it in women, and would say
that some amount of affectation was necessary to a woman's character. He
knew that his cousin Lizzie was a little liar--that she was, as Lucy had
said, a pretty animal that would turn and bite; and yet he liked his
cousin Lizzie. He did not want women to be perfect, so he would say. But
Lucy Morris, in his eyes, was perfect, and when he told her that she was
ever the queen who reigned in those castles in the air which he built, as
others build them, he told her no more than the truth.

He had fallen into these feelings, and could not now avoid them, or be
quit of them; but he could have been silent respecting them. He knew that
in former days, down at Bobsborough, he had not been altogether silent.
When he had first seen her at Fawn Court he had not been altogether
silent. But he had been warned away from Fawn Court, and in that very
warning there was conveyed, as it were, an absolution from the effect of
words hitherto spoken. Though he had called Lady Fawn an old fool, he had
known that it was so--had, after a fashion, perceived her wisdom--and had
regarded himself as a man free to decide, without disgrace, that he might
abandon ideas of ecstatic love and look out for a rich wife. Presuming
himself to be reticent for the future in reference to his darling Lucy, he
might do as he pleased with himself. Thus there had come a moment in which
he had determined that he would ask his rich cousin to marry him. In that
little project he had been interrupted, and the reader knows what had come
of it. Lord Fawn's success had not in the least annoyed him. He had only
half resolved in regard to his cousin. She was very beautiful no doubt,
and there was her income; but he also knew that those teeth would bite and
that those claws would scratch. But Lord Fawn's success had given a turn
to his thoughts, and had made him think, for a moment, that if a man
loved, he should be true to his love. The reader also knows what had come
of that--how at last he had not been reticent. He had not asked Lucy to be
his wife; but he had said that which made it impossible that he should
marry any other woman without dishonour.

As he thought of what he had done himself, he tried to remember whether
Lucy had said a word expressive of affection for himself. She had in truth
spoken very few words, and he could remember almost every one of them.
"Have I?" she had asked, when he told her that she had ever been the
princess reigning in his castles. And there had been a joy in the question
which she had not attempted to conceal. She had hesitated not at all. She
had not told him that she loved him. But there had been something sweeter
than such protestation in the question she had asked him. "Is it indeed
true," she had said, "that I have been placed there where all my joy and
all my glory lies?" It was not in her to tell a lie to him, even by a
tone. She had intended to say nothing of her love, but he knew that it had
all been told. "Have I?" he repeated the words to himself a dozen times,
and as he did so, he could hear her voice. Certainly there never was a
voice that brought home to the hearer so strong a sense of its own truth!

Why should he not at once make up his mind to marry her? He could do it.
There was no doubt of that. It was possible for him to alter the whole
manner of his life, to give up his clubs, to give up even Parliament, if
the need to do so was there, and to live as a married man on the earnings
of his profession. There was no need why he should regard himself as a
poor man. Two things, no doubt, were against his regarding himself as a
rich man. Ever since he had commenced life in London he had been more or
less in debt; and then, unfortunately, he had acquired a seat in
Parliament at a period of his career in which the dangers of such a
position were greater than the advantages. Nevertheless he could earn an
income on which he and his wife, were he to marry, could live in all
comfort; and as to his debts, if he would set his shoulder to the work
they might be paid off in a twelvemonth. There was nothing in the prospect
which would frighten Lucy, though there might be a question whether he
possessed the courage needed for so violent a change.

He had chambers in the Temple; he lived in rooms which he hired from month
to month in one of the big hotels at the West End; and he dined at his
club, or at the House, when he was not dining with a friend. It was an
expensive and a luxurious mode of life, and one from the effects of which
a man is prone to drift very quickly into selfishness. He was by no means
given to drinking, but he was already learning to like good wine. Small
economies in reference to cab-hire, gloves, umbrellas, and railway fares,
were unknown to him. Sixpences and shillings were things with which, in
his mind, it was grievous to have to burden the thoughts. The Greystocks
had all lived after that fashion. Even the dean himself was not free from
the charge of extravagance. All this Frank knew, and he did not hesitate
to tell himself that he must make a great change if he meant to marry Lucy
Morris. And he was wise enough to know that the change would become more
difficult every day that it was postponed. Hitherto the question had been
an open question with him. Could it now be an open question any longer? As
a man of honour, was he not bound to share his lot with Lucy Morris?

That evening--that Saturday evening--it so happened that he met John
Eustace at a club to which they both belonged, and they dined together.
They had long known each other, and had been thrown into closer intimacy
by the marriage between Sir Florian and Lizzie. John Eustace had never
been fond of Lizzie, and now, in truth, liked her less than ever; but he
did like Lizzie's cousin, and felt that possibly Frank might be of use to
him in the growing difficulty of managing the heir's property and looking
after the heir's interests.

"You've let the widow slip through your fingers," he said to Frank, as
they sat together at the table.

"I told you Lord Fawn was to be the lucky man," said Frank.

"I know you did. I hadn't seen it. I can only say I wish it had been the
other way."

"Why so? Fawn isn't a bad fellow."

"No, not exactly a bad fellow. He isn't, you know, what I call a good
fellow. In the first place, he is marrying her altogether for her money."

"Which is just what you advised me to do."

"I thought you really liked her. And then Fawn will be always afraid of
her, and won't be in the least afraid of us. We shall have to fight him,
and he won't fight her. He's a cantankerous fellow--is Fawn--when he's not
afraid of his adversary."

"But why should there be any fighting?"

Eustace paused a minute, and rubbed his face and considered the matter
before he answered. "She is troublesome, you know," he said.

"What, Lizzie?"

"Yes; and I begin to be afraid she'll give us as much as we know how to
do. I was with Camperdown to-day. I'm blessed if she hasn't begun to cut
down a whole side of a forest at Portray. She has no more right to touch
the timber, except for repairs about the place, than you have."

"And if she lives for fifty years," asked Greystock, "is none to be cut?"

"Yes--by consent. Of course, the regular cutting for the year is done,
year by year. That's as regular as the rents, and the produce is sold by
the acre. But she is marking the old oaks. What the deuce can she want
money for?"

"Fawn will put all that right."

"He'll have to do it," said Eustace. "Since she has been down with old
Lady Fawn, she has written a note to Camperdown--after leaving all his
letters unanswered for the last twelve-month--to tell him that Lord Fawn
is to have nothing to do with her property, and that certain people,
called Mowbray & Mopus, are her lawyers. Camperdown is in an awful way
about it."

"Lord Fawn will put it all right," said Frank.

"Camperdown is afraid that he won't. They've met twice since the
engagement was made, and Camperdown says that, at the last meeting, Fawn
gave himself airs, or was, at any rate, unpleasant. There were words about
those diamonds."

"You don't mean to say that Lord Fawn wants to keep your brother's family
jewels?"

"Camperdown didn't say that exactly; but Fawn made no offer of giving them
up. I wasn't there, and only heard what Camperdown told me. Camperdown
thinks he's afraid of her."

"I shouldn't wonder at that in the least," said Frank.

"I know there'll be trouble," continued Eustace, "and Fawn won't be able
to help us through it. She's a strong-willed, cunning, obstinate, clever
little creature. Camperdown swears he'll be too many for her, but I almost
doubt it."

"And therefore you wish I were going to marry her?"

"Yes, I do. You might manage her. The money comes from the Eustace
property, and I'd sooner it should go to you than a half-hearted, numb-
fingered, cold-blooded Whig like Fawn."

"I don't like cunning women," said Frank.

"As bargains go, it wouldn't be a bad one," said Eustace. "She's very
young, has a noble jointure, and is as handsome as she can stand. It's too
good a thing for Fawn; too good for any Whig."

When Eustace left him, Greystock lit his cigar and walked with it in his
mouth from Pall Mall to the Temple. He often worked there at night when he
was not bound to be in the House, or when the House was not sitting; and
he was now intent on mastering the mysteries of some much-complicated
legal case which had been confided to him, in order that he might present
it to a jury enveloped in increased mystery. But, as he went, he thought
rather of matrimony than of law; and he thought especially of matrimony as
it was about to affect Lord Fawn. Could a man be justified in marrying for
money, or have rational ground for expecting that he might make himself
happy by doing so? He kept muttering to himself as he went the Quaker's
advice to the old farmer, "Doan't thou marry for munny, but goa where
munny is!" But he muttered it as condemning the advice rather than
accepting it.

He could look out and see two altogether different kinds of life before
him, both of which had their allurements. There was the Belgravia-cum-
Pimlico life, the scene of which might extend itself to South Kensington,
enveloping the parks and coming round over Park Lane, and through
Grosvenor Square and Berkeley Square back to Piccadilly. Within this he
might live with lords and countesses and rich folk generally, going out to
the very best dinner parties, avoiding stupid people, having everything
the world could give, except a wife and family and home of his own. All
this he could achieve by the work which would certainly fall in his way,
and by means of that position in the world which he had already attained
by his wits. And the wife, with the family and house of his own, might be
forthcoming, should it ever come in his way to form an attachment with a
wealthy woman. He knew how dangerous were the charms of such a life as
this to a man growing old among the flesh-pots, without any one to depend
upon him. He had seen what becomes of the man who is always dining out at
sixty. But he might avoid that. "Doan't thou marry for munny, but goa
where munny is." And then there was that other outlook, the scene of which
was laid somewhere north of Oxford Street, and the glory of which
consisted in Lucy's smile, and Lucy's hand, and Lucy's kiss, as he
returned home weary from his work.

There are many men, and some women, who pass their lives without knowing
what it is to be or to have been in love. They not improbably marry--the
men do, at least, and make good average husbands. Their wives are useful
to them, and they learn to feel that a woman, being a wife, is entitled to
all the respect, protection, and honour which a man can give, or procure
for her. Such men, no doubt, often live honest lives, are good Christians,
and depart hence with hopes as justifiable as though they had loved as
well as Romeo. But yet, as men, they have lacked a something, the want of
which has made them small, and poor, and dry. It has never been felt by
such a one that there would be triumph in giving away everything belonging
to him for one little whispered, yielding word, in which there should be
acknowledgment that he had succeeded in making himself master of a human
heart. And there are other men, very many men, who have felt this love,
and have resisted it, feeling it to be unfit that Love should be lord of
all. Frank Greystock had told himself, a score of times, that it would be
unbecoming in him to allow a passion to obtain such mastery of him as to
interfere with his ambition. Could it be right that he who, as a young
man, had already done so much, who might possibly have before him so high
and great a career, should miss that, because he could not resist a
feeling which a little chit of a girl had created in his bosom--a girl
without money, without position, without even beauty; a girl as to whom,
were he to marry her, the world would say, "Oh, heaven! there has Frank
Greystock gone and married a little governess out of old Lady Fawn's
nursery"? And yet he loved her with all his heart, and to-day he had told
her of his love. What should he do next?

The complicated legal case received neither much ravelling nor unravelling
from his brains that night; but before he left his chambers he wrote the
following letter:

"MIDNIGHT, Saturday,

"All among my books and papers,

"2 Bolt Court, Middle Temple.

"DEAR, DEAR LUCY: I told you to-day that you ever had been the queen who
reigned in those palaces which I have built in Spain. You did not make me
much of an answer; but such as it was, only just one muttered doubtful-
sounding word, it has made me hope that I may be justified in asking you
to share with me a home which will not be palatial. If I am wrong--? But
no; I will not think I am wrong, or that I can be wrong. No sound coming
from you is really doubtful. You are truth itself, and the muttered word
would have been other than it was, if you had not----! may I say, had you
not already learned to love me?

"You will feel, perhaps, that I ought to have said all this to you then,
and that a letter in such a matter is but a poor substitute for a spoken
assurance of affection. You shall have the whole truth. Though I have long
loved you, I did not go down to Fawn Court with the purpose of declaring
to you my love. What I said to you was God's truth; but it was spoken
without thought at the moment. I have thought of it much since; and now I
write to you to ask you to be my wife. I have lived for the last year or
two with this hope before me; and now--. Dear, dear Lucy, I will not write
in too great confidence; but I will tell you that all my happiness is in
your hands.

"If your answer is what I hope it may be, tell Lady Fawn at once. I shall
immediately write to Bobsborough, as I hate secrets in such matters. And
if it is to be so, then I shall claim the privilege of going to Fawn Court
as soon and as often as I please.

"Yours ever and always, if you will have me,

"F. G."

He sat for an hour at his desk, with his letter lying on the table, before
he left his chambers, looking at it. If he should decide on posting it,
then would that life in Belgravia-cum-Pimlico, of which in truth he was
very fond, be almost closed for him. The lords and countesses, and rich
county members, and leading politicians, who were delighted to welcome
him, would not care for his wife; nor could he very well take his wife
among them. To live with them as a married man, he must live as they
lived, and must have his own house in their precincts. Later in life, he
might possibly work up to this; but for the present he must retire into
dim domestic security and the neighbourhood of Regent's Park. He sat
looking at the letter, telling himself that he was now, at this moment,
deciding his own fate in life. And he again muttered the Quaker's advice,
"Doan't thou marry for munny, but goa where munny is!" It may be said,
however, that no man ever writes such a letter, and then omits to send it.
He walked out of the Temple with it in his hand, and dropped it into a
pillar letter-box just outside the gate. As the envelope slipped through
his fingers, he felt that he had now bound himself to his fate.




CHAPTER XIV

"DOAN'T THOU MARRY FOR MUNNY"


As that Saturday afternoon wore itself away, there was much excitement at
Fawn Court. When Lady Fawn returned with the carriage, she heard that
Frank Greystock had been at Fawn Court; and she heard also, from Augusta,
that he had been rambling about the grounds alone with Lucy Morris. At any
exhibition of old ladies, held before a competent jury, Lady Fawn would
have taken a prize on the score of good-humour. No mother of daughters was
ever less addicted to scold and to be fretful. But just now she was a
little unhappy. Lizzie's visit had not been a success, and she looked
forward to her son's marriage with almost unmixed dismay. Mrs. Hittaway
had written daily, and in all Mrs. Hittaway's letters some addition was
made to the evil things already known. In her last letter Mrs. Hittaway
had expressed her opinion that even yet "Frederic" would escape. All this
Lady Fawn had, of course, not told to her daughters generally. To the
eldest, Augusta, it was thought expedient to say nothing, because Augusta
had been selected as the companion of the, alas, too probable future Lady
Fawn. But to Amelia something did leak out, and it became apparent that
the household was uneasy. Now, as an evil added to this, Frank Greystock
had been there in Lady Fawn's absence, walking about the grounds alone
with Lucy Morris. Lady Fawn could hardly restrain herself. "How could Lucy
be so very wrong?" she said, in the hearing both of Augusta and Amelia.

Lizzie Eustace did not hear this; but knowing very well that a governess
should not receive a lover in the absence of the lady of the house, she
made her little speech about it. "Dear Lady Fawn," she said, "my cousin
Frank came to see me while you were out."

"So I hear," said Lady Fawn.

"Frank and I are more like brother and sister than anything else. I had so
much to say to him; so much to ask him to do! I have no one else, you
know, and I had especially told him to come here."

"Of course he was welcome to come."

"Only I was afraid you might think that there was some little lover's
trick--on dear Lucy's part, you know."

"I never suspect anything of that kind," said Lady Fawn, bridling up.
"Lucy Morris is above any sort of trick. We don't have any tricks here,
Lady Eustace." Lady Fawn herself might say that Lucy was "wrong," but no
one else in that house should even suggest evil of Lucy. Lizzie retreated
smiling. To have "put Lady Fawn's back up," as she called it, was to her
an achievement and a pleasure.

But the great excitement of the evening consisted in the expected coming
of Lord Fawn. Of what nature would be the meeting between Lord Fawn and
his promised bride? Was there anything of truth in the opinion expressed
by Mrs. Hittaway that her brother was beginning to become tired of his
bargain? That Lady Fawn was tired of it herself--that she disliked Lizzie
and was afraid of her, and averse to the idea of regarding her as a
daughter-in-law-she did not now attempt to hide from herself. But there
was the engagement, known to all the world, and how could its fulfilment
now be avoided? The poor dear old woman began to repeat to herself the
first half of the Quaker's advice, "Doan't thou marry for munny."

Lord Fawn was to come down only in time for a late dinner. An ardent
lover, one would have thought, might have left his work somewhat earlier
on a Saturday, so as to have enjoyed with his sweetheart something of the
sweetness of the Saturday summer afternoon; but it was seven before he
reached Fawn Court, and the ladies were at that time in their rooms
dressing. Lizzie had affected to understand all his reasons for being so
late, and had expressed herself as perfectly satisfied. "He has more to do
than any of the others," she had said to Augusta. "Indeed the whole of our
vast Indian empire may be said to hang upon him just at present;" which
was not complimentary to Lord Fawn's chief, the Right Honourable Legge
Wilson, who at the present time represented the interests of India in the
Cabinet. "He is terribly overworked, and it is a shame; but what can one
do?"

"I think he likes work," Augusta had replied.

"But I don't like it, not so much of it; and so I shall make him
understand, my dear. But I don't complain. As long as he tells me
everything, I will never really complain." Perhaps it might some day be as
she desired; perhaps as a husband he would be thoroughly confidential and
communicative; perhaps when they two were one flesh he would tell her
everything about India; but as yet he certainly had not told her much.

"How had they better meet?" Amelia asked her mother.

"Oh, I don't know; anyhow; just as they like. We can't arrange anything
for her. If she had chosen to dress herself early, she might have seen him
as he came in; but it was impossible to tell her so." No arrangement was
therefore made, and as all the other ladies were in the drawing-room
before Lizzie came down, she had to give him his welcome in the midst of
the family circle. She did it very well. Perhaps she had thought of it,
and made her arrangements. When he came forward to greet her, she put her
cheek up, just a little, so that he might see that he was expected to kiss
it; but so little that should he omit to do so, there might be no visible
awkwardness. It must be acknowledged on Lizzie's behalf, that she could
always avoid awkwardness. He did touch her cheek with his lips, blushing
as he did so. She had her ungloved hand in his, and, still holding him,
returned into the circle. She said not a word; and what he said was of no
moment; but they had met as lovers, and any of the family who had allowed
themselves to imagine that even yet the match might be broken, now
unconsciously abandoned that hope.

"Was he always such a truant, Lady Fawn?" Lizzie asked, when it seemed to
her that no one else would speak a word.

"I don't know that there is much difference," said Lady Fawn. "Here is
dinner. Frederic, will you give--Lady Eustace your arm?" Poor Lady Fawn!
It often came to pass that she was awkward.

There were no less than ten females sitting round the board at the bottom
of which Lord Fawn took his place. Lady Fawn had especially asked Lucy to
come in to dinner, and with Lucy had come the two younger girls. At Lord
Fawn's right hand sat Lizzie, and Augusta at his left. Lady Fawn had
Amelia on one side and Lucy on the other. "So Mr. Greystock was here to-
day," Lady Fawn whispered into Lucy's ear.

"Yes; he was here."

"Oh, Lucy."

"I did not bid him come, Lady Fawn."

"I am sure of that, my dear; but--but----" Then there was no more said on
that subject on that occasion.

During the whole of the dinner the conversation was kept up at the other
end of the table by Lizzie talking to Augusta across her lover. This was
done in such a manner as to seem to include Lord Fawn in every topic
discussed. Parliament, India, the Sawab, Ireland, the special privileges
of the House of Lords, the ease of a bachelor life, and the delight of
having at his elbow just such a rural retreat as Fawn Court--these were
the fruitful themes of Lizzie's eloquence. Augusta did her part at any
rate with patience; and as for Lizzie herself, she worked with that
superhuman energy which women can so often display in making conversation
under unfavourable circumstances. The circumstances were unfavourable, for
Lord Fawn himself would hardly open his mouth; but Lizzie persevered, and
the hour of dinner passed over without any show of ill-humour or of sullen
silence. When the hour was over, Lord Fawn left the room with the ladies,
and was soon closeted with his mother, while the girls strolled out upon
the lawn. Would Lizzie play croquet? No; Lizzie would not play croquet.
She thought it probable that she might catch her lover and force him to
walk with her through the shrubberies; but Lord Fawn was not seen upon the
lawn that evening, and Lizzie was forced to content herself with Augusta
as a companion. In the course of the evening, however, her lover did say a
word to her in private. "Give me ten minutes to-morrow between breakfast
and church, Lizzie." Lizzie promised that she would do so, smiling
sweetly. Then there was a little music, and then Lord Fawn retired to his
studies.

"What is he going to say to me?" Lizzie asked Augusta the next morning.
There existed in her bosom a sort of craving after confidential
friendship, but with it there existed something that was altogether
incompatible with confidence. She thoroughly despised Augusta Fawn, and
yet would have been willing--in want of a better friend--to press Augusta
to her bosom and swear that there should ever be between them the
tenderest friendship. She desired to be the possessor of the outward shows
of all those things of which the inward facts are valued by the good and
steadfast ones of the earth. She knew what were the aspirations, what the
ambition, of an honest woman; and she knew, too, how rich were the
probable rewards of such honesty. True love, true friendship, true
benevolence, true tenderness, were beautiful to her, qualities on which
she could descant almost with eloquence; and therefore she was always
shamming love and friendship and benevolence and tenderness. She could
tell you, with words most appropriate to the subject, how horrible were
all shams, and in saying so would be not altogether insincere. Yet she
knew that she herself was ever shamming, and she satisfied herself with
shams. "What is he going to say to me?" she asked Augusta, with her hands
clasped, when she went up to put her bonnet on after breakfast.

"To fix the day, I suppose," said Augusta.

"If I thought so, I would endeavour to please him. But it isn't that. I
know his manner so well! I am sure it is not that. Perhaps it is something
about my boy. He will not wish to separate a mother from her child."

"Oh dear, no," said Augusta. "I am sure Frederic will not want to do
that."

"In anything else I will obey him," said Lizzie, again clasping her hands.
"But I must not keep him waiting, must I? I fear my future lord is
somewhat impatient." Now, if among Lord Fawn's merits one merit was more
conspicuous than another, it was that of patience. When Lizzie descended,
he was waiting for her in the hall without a thought that he was being
kept too long. "Now, Frederic! I should have been with you two whole
minutes since, if I had not had just a word to say to Augusta. I do so
love Augusta."

"She is a very good girl," said Lord Fawn.

"So true and genuine, and so full of spirit. I will come on the other side
because of my parasol and the sun. There, that will do. We have an hour
nearly before going to church; haven't we? I suppose you will go to
church."

"I intend it," said Lord Fawn.

"It is so nice to go to church," said Lizzie. Since her widowhood had
commenced she had compromised matters with the world. One Sunday she would
go to church and the next she would have a headache and a French novel and
stay in bed. But she was prepared for stricter conduct during at least the
first months of her newly-married life.

"My dear Lizzie," began Lord Fawn, "since I last saw you I have been twice
with Mr. Camperdown."

"You are not going to talk about Mr. Camperdown today?"

"Well; yes. I could not do so last night, and I shall be back in London
either to-night or before you are up tomorrow morning."

"I hate the very name of Mr. Camperdown," said Lizzie.

"I am sorry for that, because I am sure you could not find an honester
lawyer to manage your affairs for you. He does everything for me, and so
he did for Sir Florian Eustace."

"That is just the reason why I employ some one else," she answered.

"Very well. I am not going to say a word about that. I may regret it, but
I am, just at present, the last person in the world to urge you upon that
subject. What I want to say is this. You must restore those diamonds."

"To whom shall I restore them?"

"To Mr. Garnett the silversmith, if you please, or to Mr. Camperdown; or,
if you like it better, to your brother-in-law, Mr. John Eustace."

"And why am I to give up my own property?"

Lord Fawn paused for some seconds before he replied. "To satisfy my
honour," he then said. As she made him no immediate answer he continued.
"It would not suit my views that my wife should be seen wearing the jewels
of the Eustace family."

"I don't want to wear them," said Lizzie.

"Then why should you desire to keep them?"

"Because they are my own. Because I do not choose to be put upon. Because
I will not allow such a cunning old snake as Mr. Camperdown to rob me of
my property. They are my own, and you should defend my right to them."

"Do you mean to say that you will not oblige me by doing what I ask you?"

"I will not be robbed of what is my own," said Lizzie.

"Then I must declare"--and now Lord Fawn spoke very slowly--"then I must
declare that under these circumstances, let the consequences be what they
may, I must retreat from the enviable position which your favour has given
me." The words were cold and solemn, and were ill-spoken; but they were
deliberate, and had been indeed actually learned by heart.

"What do you mean?" said Lizzie, flashing round upon him.

"I mean what I say, exactly. But perhaps it may be well that I should
explain my motives more clearly."

"I don't know anything about motives, and I don't care anything about
motives. Do you mean to tell me that you have come here to threaten me
with deserting me?"

"You had better hear me."

"I don't choose to hear a word more after what you have said, unless it be
in the way of an apology, or retracting your most injurious accusation."

"I have said nothing to retract," said Lord Fawn solemnly.

"Then I will not hear another word from you. I have friends and you shall
see them."

Lord Fawn, who had thought a great deal upon the subject and had well
understood that this interview would be for him one of great difficulty,
was very anxious to induce her to listen to a few further words of
explanation. "Dear Lizzie," he began.

"I will not be addressed, sir, in that way by a man who is treating me as
you are doing," she said.

"But I want you to understand me."

"Understand you! You understand nothing yourself that a man ought to
understand. I wonder that you have the courage to be so insolent. If you
knew what you were doing, you would not have the spirit to do it."

Her words did not quite come home to him, and much of her scorn was lost
upon him. He was now chiefly anxious to explain to her that though he must
abide by the threat he had made, he was quite willing to go on with his
engagement if she would oblige him in the matter of the diamonds. "It was
necessary that I should explain to you that I could not allow that
necklace to be brought into my house."

"No one thought of taking it to your house."

"What were you to do with it, then?"

"Keep it in my own," said Lizzie stoutly. They were still walking
together, and were now altogether out of sight of the house. Lizzie in her
excitement had forgotten church, had forgotten the Fawn women--had
forgotten everything except the battle which it was necessary that she
should fight for herself. She did not mean to allow the marriage to be
broken off, but she meant to retain the necklace. The manner in which Lord
Fawn had demanded its restitution--in which there had been none of that
mock tenderness by which she might have permitted herself to be persuaded
--had made her, at any rate for the moment, as firm as steel on this
point. It was inconceivable to her that he should think himself at liberty
to go back from his promise because she would not render up property
which was in her possession, and which no one could prove not to be
legally her own! She walked on full of fierce courage, despising him, but
determined that she would marry him.

"I am afraid we do not understand each other," he said at last.

"Certainly I do not understand you, sir."

"Will you allow my mother to speak to you on the subject?"

"No. If I told your mother to give up her diamonds, what would she say?"

"But they are not yours, Lady Eustace, unless you will submit that
question to an arbitrator."

"I will submit nothing to anybody. You have no right to speak on such a
subject till after we are married."

"I must have it settled first, Lady Eustace."

"Then, Lord Fawn, you won't have it settled first. Or rather it is settled
already. I shall keep my own necklace, and Mr. Camperdown may do anything
he pleases. As for you, if you ill-treat me, I shall know where to go to."

They had now come out from the shrubbery upon the lawn, and there was the
carriage at the door, ready to take the elders of the family to church. Of
course in such a condition of affairs it would be understood that Lizzie
was one of the elders.

"I shall not go to church now," she said, as she advanced across the lawn
toward the hall door. "You will be pleased, Lord Fawn, to let your mother
know that I am detained. I do not suppose that you will dare to tell her
why." Then she sailed round at the back of the carriage and entered the
hall, in which several of the girls were standing. Among them was Augusta,
waiting to take her seat among the elders; but Lizzie passed on through
them all, without a word, and marched up to her bedroom.

"Oh, Frederic, what is the matter?" said Augusta, as soon as her brother
entered the house.

"Never mind. Nothing is the matter. You had better go to church. Where is
my mother?"

At this moment Lady Fawn appeared at the bottom of the stairs, having
passed Lizzie as she was coming down. Not a syllable had then been spoken,
but Lady Fawn at once knew that much was wrong. Her son went up to her and
whispered a word in her ear. "Oh, certainly," she said, desisting from the
operation of pulling on her gloves. "Augusta, neither your brother nor I
will go to church."

"Nor--Lady Eustace?"

"It seems not," said Lady Fawn.

"Lady Eustace will not go to church," said Lord Fawn.

"And where is Lucy?" asked Lydia.

"She will not go to church either," said Lady Fawn. "I have just been with
her."

"Nobody is going to church," said Nina. "All the same, I shall go myself."

"Augusta, my dear, you and the girls had better go. You can take the
carriage of course." But Augusta and the girls chose to walk, and the
carriage was sent round into the yard.

"There's a rumpus already between my lord and the young missus," said the
coachman to the groom; for the coachman had seen the way in which Lady
Eustace had returned to the house. And there certainly was a rumpus.
During the whole morning Lord Fawn was closeted with his mother, and then
he went away to London without saying a word to any one of the family. But
he left this note for Lady Eustace:

"DEAREST LIZZIE: Think well of what I have said to you. It is not that I
desire to break off our engagement; but that I cannot allow my wife to
keep the diamonds which belong of right to her late husband's family. You
may be sure that I should not be thus urgent had I not taken steps to
ascertain that I am right in my judgment. In the mean time you had better
consult my mother.

"Yours affectionately,

"FAWN."




CHAPTER XV

"I'LL GIVE YOU A HUNDRED-GUINEA BROOCH"


There had been another "affair" in the house that morning, though of a
nature very different to the "rumpus" which had occurred between Lord Fawn
and Lady Eustace. Lady Fawn had been closeted with Lucy, and had expressed
her opinion of the impropriety of Frank Greystock's visit. "I suppose he
came to see his cousin," said Lady Fawn, anxious to begin with some
apology for such conduct.

"I cannot tell," said Lucy. "Perhaps he did. I think he said so. I think
he cared more to see me." Then Lady Fawn was obliged to express her
opinion, and she did so, uttering many words of wisdom. Frank Greystock,
had he intended to sacrifice his prospects by a disinterested marriage,
would have spoken out before now. He was old enough to have made up his
mind on such a subject, and he had not spoken out. He did not mean
marriage. That was quite evident to Lady Fawn; and her dear Lucy was
revelling in hopes which would make her miserable. If Lucy could only have
known of the letter, which was already her own property though lying in
the pillar letter-box in Fleet Street, and which had not already been sent
down and delivered simply because it was Sunday morning! But she was very
brave. "He does love me," she said. "He told me so."

"Oh, Lucy, that is worse and worse. A man to tell you that he loves you,
and yet not ask you to be his wife!"

"I am contented," said Lucy. That assertion, however, could hardly have
been true.

"Contented! And did you tell him that you returned his love?"

"He knew it without my telling him," said Lucy. It was so hard upon her
that she should be so interrogated while that letter was lying in the iron
box!

"Dear Lucy, this must not be," said Lady Fawn. "You are preparing for
yourself inexpressible misery."

"I have done nothing wrong, Lady Fawn."

"No, my dear--no. I do not say you have been wrong. But I think he is
wrong--so wrong! I call it wicked. I do indeed. For your own sake you
should endeavour to forget him."

"I will never forget him," said Lucy. "To think of him is everything to
me. He told me I was his Queen, and he shall be my King. I will be loyal
to him always." To poor Lady Fawn this was very dreadful. The girl
persisted in declaring her love for the man, and yet did not even pretend
to think that the man meant to marry her! And this, too, was Lucy Morris--
of whom Lady Fawn was accustomed to say to her intimate friends that she
had altogether ceased to look upon her as a governess. "Just one of
ourselves, Mrs. Winslow, and almost as dear as one of my own girls!" Thus,
in the warmth of her heart, she had described Lucy to a neighbour within
the last week. Many more words of wisdom she spoke, and then she left poor
Lucy in no mood for church. Would she have been in a better mood for the
morning service had she known of the letter in the iron post?

Then Lady Fawn had put on her bonnet and gone down into the hall, and the
"rumpus" had come. After that, everybody in the house knew that all things
were astray. When the girls came home from church their brother was gone.
Half an hour before dinner Lady Fawn sent the note up to Lizzie, with a
message to say that they would dine at three--it being Sunday. Lizzie sent
down word that as she was unwell she would ask to have just a cup of tea
and "something" sent to her own room. If Lady Fawn would allow her, she
would remain up-stairs with her child. She always made use of her child
when troubles came.

The afternoon was very sad and dreary. Lady Fawn had an interview with
Lady Eustace, but Lizzie altogether refused to listen to any advice on the
subject of the necklace. "It is an affair," she said haughtily, "in which
I must judge for myself--or with the advice of my own particular friends.
Had Lord Fawn waited until we were married; then indeed--!"

"But that would have been too late," said Lady Fawn severely.

"He is, at any rate, premature now in laying his commands upon me," said
Lizzie. Lady Fawn, who was perhaps more anxious that the marriage should
be broken off than that the jewels should be restored, then withdrew; and
as she left the room Lizzie clasped her boy to her bosom. "He, at any
rate, is left to me," she said. Lucy and the Fawn girls went to evening
church, and afterwards Lizzie came down among them when they were at tea.
Before she went to bed Lizzie declared her intention of returning to her
own house in Mount Street on the following day. To this Lady Fawn of
course made no objection.

On the next morning there came an event which robbed Lizzie's departure of
some of the importance which might otherwise have been attached to it. The
post-office, with that accuracy in the performance of its duties for which
it is conspicuous among all offices, caused Lucy's letter to be delivered
to her while the members of the family were sitting round the breakfast
table. Lizzie, indeed, was not there. She had expressed her intention of
breakfasting in her own room, and had requested that a conveyance might be
ready to take her to the 11:30 train. Augusta had been with her, asking
whether anything could be done for her. "I care for nothing now, except my
child," Lizzie had replied. As the nurse and the lady's maid were both in
the room, Augusta, of course, could say nothing further. That occurred
after prayers, and while the tea was being made. When Augusta reached the
breakfast-room Lucy was cutting up the loaf of bread, and at the same
moment the old butler was placing a letter immediately under her eyes. She
saw the handwriting and recognised it, but yet she finished cutting the
bread. "Lucy, do give me that hunchy bit," said Nina.

"Hunchy is not in the dictionary," said Cecilia.

"I want it in my plate, and not in the dictionary," said Nina.

Lucy did as she was asked, but her hand trembled as she gave the hunch,
and Lady Fawn saw that her face was crimson. She took the letter and broke
the envelope, and as she drew out the sheet of paper she looked up at Lady
Fawn. The fate of her whole life was in her hands, and there she was
standing with all their eyes fixed upon her. She did not even know how to
sit down, but, still standing, she read the first and last words, "Dear,
dear Lucy,"--"Yours ever and always, if you will have me, F. G." She did
not want to read any more of it then. She sat down slowly, put the
precious paper back into its envelope, looked round upon them all, and
knew that she was crimson to the roots of her hair, blushing like a guilty
thing.

"Lucy, my dear," said Lady Fawn--and Lucy at once turned her face full
upon her old friend--"you have got a letter that agitates you."

"Yes, I have," she said.

"Go into the book-room. You can come back to breakfast when you have read
it, you know." Thereupon Lucy rose from her seat, and retired with her
treasure into the book-room. But even when she was there she could not at
once read her letter. When the door was closed and she knew that she was
alone she looked at it, and then clasped it tight between her hands. She
was almost afraid to read it least the letter itself should contradict the
promise which the last words of it had seemed to convey to her. She went
up to the window and stood there gazing out upon the gravel road, with her
hand containing the letter pressed upon her heart. Lady Fawn had told her
that she was preparing for herself inexpressible misery; and now there had
come to her joy so absolutely inexpressible! "A man to tell you that he
loves you, and yet not ask you to be his wife!" She repeated to herself
Lady Fawn's words, and then those other words, "Yours ever and always, if
you will have me!" Have him, indeed! She threw from her, at once, as vain
and wicked and false, all idea of coying her love. She would leap at his
neck if he were there, and tell him that for years he had been almost her
god. And of course he knew it. "If I will have him! Traitor!" she said to
herself, smiling through her tears. Then she reflected that after all it
would be well that she should read the letter. There might be conditions;
though what conditions could he propose with which she would not comply?
However, she seated herself in a corner of the room and did read the
letter. As she read it, she hardly understood it all; but she understood
what she wanted to understand. He asked her to share with him his home. He
had spoken to her that day without forethought; but mustn't such speech be
the truest and the sweetest of all speeches? "And now I write to you to
ask you to be my wife." Oh, how wrong some people can be in their
judgments! How wrong Lady Fawn had been in hers about Frank Greystock!
"For the last year or two I have lived with this hope before me." "And so
have I," said Lucy. "And so have I; with that and no other." "Too great
confidence! Traitor," she said again, smiling and weeping, "yes, traitor;
when of course you knew it." "Is his happiness in my hands? Oh, then he
shall be happy." "Of course I will tell Lady Fawn at once--instantly. Dear
Lady Fawn! But yet she has been so wrong. I suppose she will let him come
here. But what does it matter, now that I know it? "Yours ever and always,
if you will have me. F. G." Traitor, traitor, traitor!" Then she got up
and walked about the room, not knowing what she did, holding the letter
now between her hands, and then pressing it to her lips.

She was still walking about the room when there came a low tap at the
door, and Lady Fawn entered. "There is nothing the matter, Lucy?" Lucy
stood stock still, with her treasure still clasped, smiling, almost
laughing, while the tears ran down her cheeks. "Won't you eat your
breakfast, my dear?" said Lady Fawn.

"Oh, Lady Fawn! Oh, Lady Fawn!" said Lucy, rushing into her friend's arms.

"What is it, Lucy? I think our little wise one has lost her wits."

"Oh, Lady Fawn, he has asked me!"

"Is it Mr. Greystock?"

"Yes; Mr. Greystock. He has asked me. He has asked me to be his wife. I
thought he loved me. I hoped he did at least. Oh dear, I did so hope it.
And he does."

"Has he proposed to you?"

"Yes, Lady Fawn. I told you what he said to me. And then he went and wrote
this. Is he not noble and good, and so kind? You shall read it, but you'll
give it me back, Lady Fawn?"

"Certainly I'll give it you back. You don't think I'd rob you of your
lover's letter?"

"Perhaps you might think it right."

"If it is really an offer of marriage----," said Lady Fawn very seriously.

"It couldn't be more of an offer if he had sat writing it for ever," said
Lucy as she gave up her letter with confidence. Lady Fawn read it with
leisurely attention, and smiled as she put the paper back into the
envelope. "All the men in the world couldn't say it more plainly," said
Lucy, nodding her head forward.

"I don't think they could," said Lady Fawn. "I never read anything plainer
in my life. I wish you joy with all my heart, Lucy. There is not a word to
be said against him."

"Against him!" said Lucy, who thought that this was very insufficient
praise.

"What I mean is that when I objected to his coming here I was only afraid
that he couldn't afford, or would think, you know, that in his position he
couldn't afford to marry a wife without a fortune."

"He may come now, Lady Fawn?"

"Well, yes; I think so. I shall be glad just to say a word to him. Of
course you are in my hands, and I do love you so dearly, Lucy! I could not
bear that anything but good should happen to you."

"This is good," said Lucy.

"It won't be good, and Mr. Greystock won't think you good, if you don't
come and eat your breakfast." So Lucy was led back into the parlour, and
sipped her tea and crunched her toast, while Lydia came and stood over
her.

"Of course it is from him," whispered Lydia. Lucy again nodded her head
while she was crunching her toast.

The fact that Mr. Greystock had proposed in form to Lucy Morris was soon
known to all the family, and the news certainly did take away something
from the importance which would otherwise have been attached to Lizzie's
departure. There was not the same awe of the ceremony, the same dread of
some scene, which, but for Frank Greystock's letter, would have existed.
Of course Lord Fawn's future matrimonial prospects were to them all an
affair of more moment than those of Lucy; but Lord Fawn himself had gone,
and had already quarrelled with the lady before he went. There was at
present nothing more to be done by them in regard to Lizzie than just to
get rid of her. But Lucy's good fortune, so unexpected, and by her so
frankly owned as the very best fortune in the world that could have
befallen her, gave an excitement to them all. There could be no lessons
that morning for Nina, and the usual studies of the family were altogether
interrupted. Lady Fawn purred, and congratulated, and gave good advice,
and declared that any other home for Lucy before her marriage would now be
quite out of the question. "Of course it wouldn't do for you to go, even
to Clara," said Lady Fawn, who seemed to think that there still might be
some delay before Frank Greystock would be ready for his wife. "You know,
my dear, that he isn't rich; not for a member of Parliament. I suppose he
makes a good income, but I have always heard that he was a little backward
when he began. Of course, you know, nobody need be in a hurry." Then Lucy
began to think that if Frank should wish to postpone his marriage, say for
three or four years, she might even yet become a burden on her friend.
"But don't you be frightened," continued Lady Fawn; "you shall never want
a home as long as I have one to give you. We shall soon find out what are
Mr. Greystock's ideas; and unless he is very unreasonable we'll make
things fit."

Then there came a message to Lucy from Lady Eustace. "If you please, Miss,
Lady Eustace will be glad to see you for a minute up in her room before
she starts." So Lucy was torn away from the thoughts of her own happiness,
and taken upstairs to Lady Eustace. "You have heard that I am going?" said
Lizzie.

"Yes; I heard you were to go this morning."

"And you have heard why? I'm sure you will not deceive me, Lucy. Where am
I to look for truth, if not to an old, old friend like you?"

"Why should I deceive you, Lizzie?"

"Why, indeed? Only that all people do. The world is so false, so material,
so worldly! One gives out one's heart and gets in return nothing but dust
and ashes--nothing but ashes and dust. Oh, I have been so disappointed in
Lady Fawn."

"You know she is my dearest friend," said Lucy.

"Pshaw! I know that you have worked for her like a slave, and that she has
paid you a bare pittance."

"She has been more like a mother to me than anything else," said Lucy
angrily.

"Because you have been tame. It does not suit me to be tame. It is not my
plan to be tame. Have you heard the cause of the disagreement between Lord
Fawn and me?"

"Well--no."

"Tell the truth, Lucy."

"How dare you tell me to tell the truth? Of course I tell the truth. I
believe it is something about some property which he wants you to give
back to somebody; but I don't know any more."

"Yes, my dear husband, Sir Florian, who understood me--whom I idolised--
who seemed to have been made for me--gave me a present. Lord Fawn is
pleased to say that he does not approve of my keeping any gift from my
late lord. Considering that he intends to live upon the wealth which Sir
Florian was generous enough to bestow upon me, this does seem to be
strange! Of course I resented such interference. Would not you have
resented it?"

"I don't know," said Lucy, who thought that she could bring herself to
comply with any request made to her by Frank Greystock.

"Any woman who had a spark of spirit would resent it, and I have resented
it. I have told Lord Fawn that I will on no account part with the rich
presents which my adored Florian showered upon me in his generosity. It is
not for their richness that I keep them, but because they are, for his
sake, so inexpressively dear to me. If Lord Fawn chooses to be jealous of
a necklace, he must be jealous." Lucy, who had in truth heard but a small
fragment of the story--just so much of it as Lydia had learned from the
discreet Amelia, who herself had but a very hazy idea of the facts--did
not quite know how much of the tale, as it was now told to her, might be
true and how much false. After a certain fashion she and Lizzie Eustace
called themselves friends. But she did not believe her friend to be
honest, and was aware that in some matters her friend would condescend--to
fib. Lizzie's poetry, and romance, and high feelings had never had the
ring of true soundness in Lucy's ears. But her imagination was not strong
enough to soar to the altitude of the lies which Lizzie was now telling.
She did believe that the property which Lizzie was called upon to restore
was held to be objectionable by Lord Fawn simply because it had reached
Lizzie from the hands of her late husband. "What do you think of such
conduct as that?" asked Lady Eustace.

"Won't it do if you lock them up instead of wearing them?" asked Lucy.

"I have never dreamed of wearing them."

"I don't understand about such things," said Lucy, determined not to
impute any blame to one of the Fawn family.

"It is tyranny, sheer tyranny," continued the other, "and he will find
that I am not the woman to yield to it. No. For love I could give up
everything--but nothing from fear. He has told me in so many words that he
does not intend to go on with his engagement!"

"Has he indeed?"

"But I intend that he shall. If he thinks that I am going to be thrown
over because he takes ideas of that kind into his head, he's mistaken. He
shall know that I'm not to be made a plaything of like that. I'll tell you
what you can do for me, Lucy."

"What can I do for you?"

"There is no one in the world I trust more thoroughly than I do you," said
Lizzie, "and hardly any one that I love so well. Think how long we have
known each other! And you may be sure of this: I always have been, and
always will be, your friend with my cousin Frank."

"I don't want anything of that kind," said Lucy, "and never did."

"Nobody has so much influence with Frank as I. Just do you write to me to-
morrow, and the next day, and the day after, a mere line, you know, to
tell me how the land lies here."

"There will be nothing to tell."

"Yes, there will--ever so much. They will be talking about me every hour.
If you'll be true to me, Lucy, in this business, I'll make you the
handsomest present you ever saw in your life. I'll give you a hundred-
guinea brooch; I will, indeed. You shall have the money and buy it
yourself."

"A what!" said Lucy.

"A hundred guineas to do what you please with!"

"You mean thing!" said Lucy. "I didn't think there was a woman so mean as
that in the world. I'm not surprised now at Lord Fawn. Pick up what I hear
and send it you in letters, and then be paid money for it!"

"Why not? It's all to do good."

"How can you have thought to ask me to do such a thing? How can you bring
yourself to think so badly of people? I'd sooner cut my hand off; and as
for you, Lizzie, I think you are mean and wicked to conceive such a thing.
And now good-by." So saying, she left the room, giving her dear friend no
time for further argument.

Lady Eustace got away that morning, not in time, indeed, for the 11:30
train, but at such an hour as to make it unnecessary that she should
appear at the early dinner. The saying of farewell was very cold and
ceremonious. Of course there was no word as to any future visit--no word
as to any future events whatever. They all shook hands with her, and
special injunctions were given to the coachman to drive her safely to the
station. At this ceremony Lucy was not present. Lydia had asked her to
come down and say good-by; but Lucy refused. "I saw her in her own room,"
said Lucy.

"And was it all very affectionate?" Lydia asked.

"Well, no; it was not affectionate at all." This was all that Lucy said,
and thus Lady Eustace completed her visit to Fawn Court.

The letters were taken away for the post at eight o'clock in the evening,
and before that time it was necessary that Lucy should write to her lover.
"Lady Fawn," she said in a whisper, "may I tell him to come here?"

"Certainly, my dear. You had better tell him to call on me. Of course
he'll see you, too, when he comes,"

"I think he'd want to see me," said Lucy, "and I'm sure I should want to
see him." Then she wrote her answer to Frank's letter. She allowed herself
an hour for the happy task; but, though the letter when written was short,
the hour hardly sufficed for the writing of it.

"DEAR MR. GREYSTOCK:"--There was matter for her of great consideration
before she could get even so far as this; but after biting her pen for ten
minutes, during which she pictured to herself how pleasant it would be to
call him Frank when he should have told her to do so, and had found, upon
repeated whispered trials, that of all names it was the pleasantest to
pronounce, she decided upon refraining from writing it now--"Lady Fawn has
seen your letter to me--the dearest letter that ever was written--and she
says that you may call upon _her_. But you mustn't go away without seeing
_me too_." Then there was great difficulty as to the words to be used by
her for the actual rendering herself up to him as his future wife. At last
the somewhat too Spartan simplicity of her nature prevailed, and the words
were written very plain, and very short. "I love you better than all the
world, and I will be your wife. It shall be the happiness of my life to
try to deserve you.

"I am, with all my heart,

"Most affectionately your own

"LUCY."

When it was written it did not content her. But the hour was over, and the
letters must go. "I suppose it'll do," she said to herself. "He'll know
what it means." And so the letter was sent.




CHAPTER XVI

CERTAINLY AN HEIRLOOM


The burden of his position was so heavy on Lord Fawn's mind that, on the
Monday morning after leaving Fawn Court, he was hardly as true to the
affairs of India as he himself would have wished. He was resolved to do
what was right--if only he could find out what would be the right thing in
his present difficulty. Not to break his word, not to be unjust, not to
deviate by a hair's breadth from that line of conduct which would be
described as "honourable" in the circle to which he belonged; not to give
his political enemies an opportunity for calumny--this was all in all to
him. The young widow was very lovely and very rich, and it would have
suited him well to marry her. It would still suit him well to do so, if
she would make herself amenable to reason and the laws. He had assured
himself that he was very much in love with her, and had already, in his
imagination, received the distinguished heads of his party at Portray
Castle. But he would give all this up--love, income, beauty, and castle--
without a doubt, rather than find himself in the mess of having married a
wife who had stolen a necklace, and who would not make restitution. He
might marry her, and insist on giving it up afterwards; but he foresaw
terrible difficulties in the way of such an arrangement. Lady Eustace was
self-willed, and had already told him that she did not intend to keep the
jewels in his house--but in her own! What should he do, so that no human
being--not the most bigoted Tory that ever expressed scorn for a Whig
lord--should be able to say that he had done wrong? He was engaged to the
lady, and could not simply change his mind and give no reason. He believed
in Mr. Camperdown; but he could hardly plead that belief, should he
hereafter be accused of heartless misconduct. For aught he knew Lady
Eustace might bring an action against him for breach of promise, and
obtain a verdict and damages, and annihilate him as an Under-Secretary.
How should he keep his hands quite clean?

Frank Greystock was, as far as he knew, Lizzie's nearest relative in
London. The dean was her uncle, but then the dean was down at Bobsborough.
It might be necessary for him to go down to Bobsborough; but in the mean
time he would see Frank Greystock. Greystock was as bitter a Tory as any
in England. Greystock was the very man who had attacked him, Lord Fawn, in
the House of Commons respecting the Sawab--making the attack quite
personal--and that without a shadow of a cause! Within the short straight
grooves of Lord Fawn's intellect the remembrance of this supposed wrong
was always running up and down, renewing its own soreness. He regarded
Greystock as an enemy who would lose no opportunity of injuring him. In
his weakness and littleness he was quite unable to judge of other men by
himself. He would not go a hair's breadth astray, if he knew it; but
because Greystock had, in debate, called him timid and tyrannical, he
believed that Greystock would stop short of nothing that might injure him.
And yet he must appeal to Greystock. He did appeal, and in answer to his
appeal Frank came to him at the India House. But Frank, before he saw Lord
Fawn, had, as was fitting, been with his cousin.

Nothing was decided at this interview. Lord Fawn became more than ever
convinced that the member for Bobsborough was his determined enemy, and
Frank was more convinced than ever that Lord Fawn was an empty, stiff-
necked, self-sufficient prig.

Greystock, of course, took his cousin's part. He was there to do so; and
he himself did not really know whether Lizzie was or was not entitled to
the diamonds. The lie which she had first fabricated for the benefit of
Mr. Benjamin when she had the jewels valued, and which she had since told
with different degrees of precision to various people--to Lady Linlithgow,
to Mr. Camperdown, to Lucy, and to Lord Fawn--she now repeated with
increased precision to her cousin. Sir Florian, in putting the trinket
into her hands, had explained to her that it was very valuable, and that
she was to regard it as her own peculiar property. "If it was an heirloom
he couldn't do it," Frank had said, with all the confidence of a
practising barrister.

"He made it over as an heirloom to me," said Lizzie, with plaintive
tenderness.

"That's nonsense, dear Lizzie." Then she smiled sweetly on him, and patted
the back of his hand with hers. She was very gentle with him, and bore his
assumed superiority with pretty meekness. "He could not make it over as an
heirloom to you. If it was his to give, he could give it to you."

"It was his--certainly."

"That is just what I cannot tell as yet, and what must be found out. If
the diamonds formed part of an heirloom--and there is evidence that it is
so--you must give them up. Sir Florian could only give away what was his
own to give."

"But Lord Fawn had no right to dictate."

"Certainly not," said Frank; and then he made a promise, which he knew to
be rash, that he would stand by his pretty cousin in this affair. "I don't
see why you should assume that Lady Eustace is keeping property that
doesn't belong to her," he said to Lord Fawn.

"I go by what Camperdown tells me," said Lord Fawn.

"Mr. Camperdown is a very excellent attorney, and a most respectable man,"
said Greystock. "I have nothing on earth to say against Mr. Camperdown.
But Mr. Camperdown isn't the law and the prophets, nor yet can we allow
him to be judge and jury in such a case as this."

"Surely, Mr. Greystock, you wouldn't wish it to go before a jury."

"You don't understand me, Lord Fawn. If any claim be really made for these
jewels by Mr. John Eustace on the part of the heir, or on behalf of the
estate, a statement had better be submitted to counsel. The family deeds
must be inspected, and no doubt counsel would agree in telling my cousin,
Lady Eustace, what she should or what she should not do. In the mean time,
I understand that you are engaged to marry her."

"I was engaged to her, certainly," said Lord Fawn.

"You can hardly mean to assert, my lord, that you intend to be untrue to
your promise, and to throw over your own engagement because my cousin has
expressed her wish to retain property which she believes to be her own!"
This was said in a tone which made Lord Fawn surer than ever that
Greystock was his enemy to the knife. Personally, he was not a coward; and
he knew enough of the world to be quite sure that Greystock would not
attempt any personal encounter. But morally, Lord Fawn was a coward, and
he did fear that the man before him would work him some bitter injury.
"You cannot mean that," continued Frank, "and you will probably allow me
to assure my cousin that she misunderstood you in the matter."

"I'd sooner see Mr. Camperdown again before I say anything."

"I cannot understand, Lord Fawn, that a gentleman should require an
attorney to tell him what to do in such a case as this." They were
standing now, and Lord Fawn's countenance was heavy, troubled, and full of
doubt. He said nothing, and was probably altogether unaware how eloquent
was his face. "My cousin, Lady Eustace," continued Frank, "must not be
kept in this suspense. I agree on her behalf that her title to these
trinkets must be made the subject of inquiry by persons adequate to form a
judgment. Of course, I, as her relative, shall take no part in that
inquiry. But as her relative, I must demand from you an admission that
your engagement with her cannot in any way be allowed to depend on the
fate of those jewels. She has chosen to accept you as her future husband,
and I am bound to see that she is treated with good faith, honour, and
fair observance."

Frank made his demand very well, while Lord Fawn was looking like a
whipped dog. "Of course," said his lordship, "all I want is, that the
right thing should be done."

"The right thing will be done. My cousin wishes to keep nothing that is
not her own. I may tell her, then, that she will receive from you an
assurance that you have had no intention of departing from your word."
After this, Lord Fawn made some attempt at a stipulation that this
assurance to Lizzie was to be founded on the counter-assurance given to
him that the matter of the diamonds should be decided by proper legal
authority; but Frank would not submit to this, and at last the Under-
Secretary yielded. The engagement was to remain in force. Counsel were to
be employed. The two lovers were not to see each other just at present.
And when the matter had been decided by the lawyers, Lord Fawn was to
express his regret for having suspected his lady-love! That was the verbal
agreement, according to Frank Greystock's view of it. Lord Fawn, no doubt,
would have declared that he had never consented to the latter stipulation.

About a week after this there was a meeting at Mr. Camperdown's chambers.
Greystock, as his cousin's friend, attended to hear what Mr. Camperdown
had to say in the presence of Lord Fawn and John Eustace. He, Frank, had
in the mean time been down to Richmond, had taken Lucy to his arms as his
future bride, and had been closeted with Lady Fawn. As a man who was doing
his duty by Lucy Morris, he was welcomed and made much of by her ladyship;
but it had been impossible to leave Lizzie's name altogether unmentioned,
and Frank had spoken as the champion of his cousin. Of course there had
arisen something of ill-feeling between the two. Lady Fawn had taught
herself to hate Lizzie, and was desirous that the match should be over,
diamonds or no diamonds. She could not quite say this to her visitor, but
she showed her feeling very plainly. Frank was courteous, cold, and
resolute in presuming, or pretending to presume, that as a matter of
course the marriage would take place. Lady Fawn intended to be civil, but
she could not restrain her feeling; and though she did not dare to say
that her son would have nothing more to do with Lizzie Eustace, she showed
very plainly that she intended to work with that object. Of course the two
did not part as cordial friends, and of course poor Lucy perceived that it
was so. Before the meeting took place, Mr. Camperdown had been at work
looking over old deeds. It is undoubtedly the case that things often
become complicated which, from the greatness of their importance, should
have been kept clear as running water. The diamonds in question had been
bought, with other jewels, by Sir Florian's grandfather, on the occasion
of his marriage with the daughter of a certain duke, on which occasion old
family jewels, which were said to have been heirlooms, were sold or given
in exchange as part value for those then purchased. This grandfather, who
had also been Sir Florian in his time, had expressly stated in his will
that these jewels were to be regarded as an heirloom in the family, and
had as such left them to his eldest son, and to that son's eldest son,
should such a child be born. His eldest son had possessed them, but not
that son's son. There was such a Eustace born, but he had died before his
father. The younger son of that old Sir Florian had then succeeded as Sir
Thomas, and he was the father of that Florian who had married Lizzie
Eustace. That last Sir Florian had therefore been the fourth in succession
from the old Sir Florian by whom the will had been made, and who had
directed that these jewels should be regarded as heirlooms in the family.
The two intermediate baronets had made no allusion to the diamonds in any
deeds executed by them. Indeed, Sir Florian's father had died without a
will. There were other jewels, larger but much less valuable than the
diamonds, still in the hands of the Messrs. Garnett, as to which no
question was raised. The late Sir Florian had, by his will, left all the
property in his house at Portray to his widow, but all property elsewhere
to his heir. This was what Mr. Camperdown had at last learned, but he had
been forced to admit to himself, while learning this, that there was
confusion.

He was confident enough, however, that there was no difficulty in the
matter. The Messrs. Garnett were able to say that the necklace had been in
their keeping, with various other jewels still in their possession, from
the time of the death of the late Lady Eustace, up to the marriage of the
late Sir Florian, her son. They stated the date on which the jewels were
given up to be the 24th of September, which was the day after Sir
Florian's return from Scotland with his bride. Lizzie's first statement
had coincided with this entry in the Messrs. Garnett's books; but latterly
she had asserted that the necklace had been given to her in Scotland. When
Mr. Camperdown examined the entry himself in the jeweller's book, he found
the figures to be so blotted that they might represent either the 4th or
24th September. Now, the 4th September had been the day preceding Sir
Florian's marriage. John Eustace only knew that he had seen the necklace
worn in Scotland by his mother. The bishop only knew that he had often
seen them on the neck of his sister-in-law when, as was very often the
case, she appeared in full-blown society. Mr. Camperdown believed that he
had traced two stories to Lizzie--one, repeated more than once, that the
diamonds had been given to her in London, and a second, made to himself,
that they had been given to her at Portray. He himself believed that they
had never been in Scotland since the death of the former Lady Eustace; but
he was quite confident that he could trust altogether to the disposition
made of them by the old Sir Florian. There could be no doubt as to these
being the diamonds there described, although the setting had been altered.
Old Mr. Garnett stated that he would swear to them if he saw the necklace.

"You cannot suppose that Lady Eustace wishes to keep anything that is not
her own," said Frank Greystock.

"Of course not," said John Eustace.

"Nobody imagines it," said Mr. Camperdown. Lord Fawn, who felt that he
ought not to be there, and who did not know whether he might with a better
grace take Lizzie's part or a part against her, said nothing. "But,"
continued Mr. Camperdown, "there is luckily no doubt as to the facts. The
diamonds in question formed a part of a set of most valuable ornaments
settled in the family by Sir Florian Eustace in 1799. The deed was drawn
up by my grandfather, and is now here. I do not know how we are to have
further proof. Will you look at the deed, Mr. Greystock, and at the will?"
Frank suggested that as it might probably be expedient to take advice on
the subject professionally, he had rather not look at the deed. Anything
which he might say, on looking at the document now, could have no weight.
"But why should any advice be necessary," said Mr. Camperdown, "when the
matter is so clear?"

"My dear sir," said Frank, "my cousin, Lady Eustace, is strong in her
confidence that her late husband intended to give them to her as her own,
and that he would not have done this without the power of doing so." Now
Mr. Camperdown was quite sure that Lizzie was lying in this, and could
therefore make no adequate answer. "Your experience must probably have
told you," continued Frank, "that there is considerable difficulty in
dealing with the matter of heirlooms."

"I never heard of any such difficulty," said Mr. Camperdown.

"People generally understand it all so clearly," said Lord Fawn.

"The late Sir Florian does not appear to have understood it very clearly,"
said Frank.

"Let her put them into the hands of any indifferent person or firm till
the matter is decided," said Mr. Camperdown. "They will be much safer so
than in her keeping."

"I think they are quite safe," said Frank.

And this was all that took place at that meeting. As Mr. Camperdown said
to John Eustace, it was manifest enough that she meant "to hang on to
them." "I only hope Lord Fawn will not be fool enough to marry her," said
Mr. Camperdown. Lord Fawn himself was of the same way of thinking; but
then how was he to clear his character of the charge which would be
brought against him; and how was he to stand his ground before Frank
Greystock?




CHAPTER XVII

THE DIAMONDS ARE SEEN IN PUBLIC


Let it not be supposed that Lady Eustace during these summer weeks was
living the life of a recluse. The London season was in its full splendour,
and she was by no means a recluse. During the first year of her widowhood
she had been every inch a widow, as far as crape would go, and a quiet
life either at Bobsborough or Portray Castle. During this year her child
was born, and she was in every way thrown upon her good behaviour, living
with bishops' wives and deans' daughters. Two years of retreat from the
world is generally thought to be the proper thing for a widow. Lizzie had
not quite accomplished her two years before she reopened the campaign in
Mount Street with very small remnants of weeds, and with her crape brought
down to a minimum; but she was young and rich, and the world is aware that
a woman of twenty-two can hardly afford to sacrifice two whole years. In
the matter of her widowhood Lizzie did not encounter very much reproach.
She was not shunned, or so ill spoken of as to have a widely-spread bad
name among the streets and squares in which her carriage-wheels rolled.
People called her a flirt, held up their hands in surprise at Sir
Florian's foolish generosity--for the accounts of Lizzie's wealth were
greatly exaggerated--and said that of course she would marry again.

The general belief which often seizes upon the world in regard to some
special falsehood is very surprising. Everybody on a sudden adopts an idea
that some particular man is over head and ears in debt, so that he can
hardly leave his house for fear of the bailiffs; or that some ill-fated
woman is cruelly ill-used by her husband; or that some eldest son has
ruined his father; whereas the man doesn't owe a shilling, the woman never
hears a harsh word from her lord, and the eldest son in question has never
succeeded in obtaining a shilling beyond his allowance. One of the lies
about London this season was founded on the extent of Lady Eustace's
jointure. Indeed the lie went to state that the jointure was more than a
jointure. It was believed that the property in Ayrshire was her own, to do
what she pleased with it. That the property in Ayrshire was taken at
double its value was a matter of course. It had been declared, at the time
of his marriage, that Sir Florian had been especially generous to his
penniless wife, and the generosity was magnified in the ordinary way. No
doubt Lizzie's own diligence had done much to propagate the story as to
her positive ownership of Portray. Mr. Camperdown had been very busy
denying this. John Eustace had denied it whenever occasion offered. The
bishop in his quiet way had denied it. Lady Linlithgow had denied it. But
the lie had been set on foot and had thriven, and there was hardly a man
about town who didn't know that Lady Eustace had eight or nine thousand a
year, altogether at her own disposal, down in Scotland. Of course a woman
so endowed, so rich, so beautiful, so clever, so young, would marry again,
and would marry well. No doubt, added to this there was a feeling that
"Lizzie," as she was not uncommonly called by people who had hardly ever
seen her, had something amiss with it all. "I don't know where it is she's
lame," said that very clever man, Captain Boodle, who had lately
reappeared among his military friends at his club, "but she don't go flat
all round."

"She has the devil of a temper, no doubt," said Lieutenant Griggs.

"No mouth, I should say," said Boodle. It was thus that Lizzie was talked
about at the clubs; but she was asked to dinners and balls, and gave
little dinners herself, and to a certain extent was the fashion. Everybody
had declared that of course she would marry again, and now it was known
everywhere that she was engaged to Lord Fawn.

"Poor dear Lord Fawn!" said Lady Glencora Palliser to her dear friend
Madame Max Goesler; "do you remember how violently he was in love with
Violet Effingham two years ago?"

"Two years is a long time, Lady Glencora; and Violet Effingham has chosen
another husband."

"But isn't this a fall for him? Violet was the sweetest girl out, and at
one time I really thought she meant to take him."

"I thought she meant to take another man whom she did not take," said Mme.
Goesler, who had her own recollections, who was a widow herself, and who,
at the period to which Lady Glencora was referring, had thought that
perhaps she might cease to be a widow. Not that she had ever suggested to
herself that Lord Fawn might be her second husband.

"Poor Lord Fawn!" continued Lady Glencora. "I suppose he is terribly in
want of money."

"But surely Lady Eustace is very pretty."

"Yes; she is very pretty; nay more, she is quite lovely to look at. And
she is clever, very. And she is rich, very. But----"

"Well, Lady Glencora. What does your 'but' mean?"

"Who ever explains a 'but'? You're a great deal too clever, Mme. Goesler,
to want any explanation. And I couldn't explain it. I can only say I'm
sorry for poor Lord Fawn, who is a gentleman, but will never set the
Thames on fire."

"No, indeed. All the same, I like Lord Fawn extremely," said Mme. Goesler,
"and I think he's just the man to marry Lady Eustace. He's always at his
office or at the House."

"A man may be a great deal at his office, and a great deal more at the
House than Lord Fawn," said Lady Glencora laughing, "and yet think about
his wife, my dear." For of all men known, no man spent more hours at the
House or in his office than did Lady Glencora's husband, Mr. Palliser, who
at this time, and had now for more than two years, filled the high place
of Chancellor of the Exchequer.

This conversation took place in Mme. Goesler's little drawing-room in Park
Lane; but, three days after this, the same two ladies met again at the
house then occupied by Lady Chiltern in Portman Square--Lady Chiltern,
with whom, as Violet Effingham, poor Lord Fawn had been much in love. "I
think it the nicest match in the world for him," Lady Chiltern had said to
Mme. Goesler.

"But have you heard of the diamonds?" asked Lady Glencora.

"What diamonds?" "Whose diamonds?" Neither of the others had heard of the
diamonds, and Lady Glencora was able to tell her story. Lady Eustace had
found all the family jewels belonging to the Eustace family in the strong
plate-room at Portray Castle, and had taken possession of them as property
found in her own house. John Eustace and the bishop had combined in
demanding them on behalf of the heir, and a lawsuit had been commenced!
The diamonds were the most costly belonging to any commoner in England,
and had been valued at twenty-four thousand pounds! Lord Fawn had
retreated from his engagement the moment he heard that any doubt was
thrown on Lady Eustace's right to their possession! Lady Eustace had
declared her intention of bringing an action against Lord Fawn, and had
also secreted the diamonds! The reader will be aware that this statement
was by no means an accurate history of the difficulty as far as it had as
yet progressed. It was, indeed, absolutely false in every detail; but it
sufficed to show that the matter was becoming public.

"You don't mean to say that Lord Fawn is off?" asked Mme. Goesler.

"I do," said Lady Glencora.

"Poor Lord Fawn!" exclaimed Lady Chiltern. "It really seems as though he
never would be settled."

"I don't think he has courage enough for such conduct as that," said Mme.
Goesler.

"And besides, Lady Eustace's income is quite certain," said Lady Chiltern,
"and poor dear Lord Fawn does want money so badly."

"But it is very disagreeable," said Lady Glencora, "to believe that your
wife has got the finest diamonds in England, and then to find that she has
only--stolen them. I think Lord Fawn is right. If a man does marry for
money, he should have the money. I wonder she ever took him. There is no
doubt about her beauty, and she might have done better."

"I won't hear Lord Fawn belittled," said Lady Chiltern.

"Done better!" said Mme. Goesler. "How could she have done better? He is a
peer, and her son would be a peer. I don't think she could have done
better." Lady Glencora in her time had wished to marry a man who had
sought her for her money. Lady Chiltern in her time had refused to be Lady
Fawn. Mme. Goesler in her time had declined to marry an English peer.
There was, therefore, something more of interest in the conversation to
each of them than was quite expressed in the words spoken. "Is she to be
at your party on Friday, Lady Glencora?" asked Mme. Goesler.

"She has said she would come, and so has Lord Fawn; for that matter, Lord
Fawn dines with us. She'll find that out, and then she'll stay away."

"Not she," said Lady Chiltern. "She'll come for the sake of the bravado.
She's not the woman to show the white feather."

"If he's ill-using her she's quite right," said Mme. Goesler.

"And wear the very diamonds in dispute," said Lady Chiltern. It was thus
that the matter was discussed among ladies in the town.

"Is Fawn's marriage going on?" This question was asked of Mr. Legge Wilson
by Barrington Erle. Mr. Legge Wilson was the Secretary of State for India,
and Barrington Erle was in the Government.

"Upon my word I don't know," said Mr. Wilson. "The work goes on at the
office; that's all I know about Fawn. He hasn't told me of his marriage,
and therefore I haven't spoken to him about it."

"He hasn't made it official?"

"The papers haven't come before me yet," said Mr. Wilson.

"When they do they'll be very awkward papers, as far as I hear," said
Barrington Erle. "There is no doubt they were engaged, and I believe there
is no doubt that he has declared off, and refused to give any reason."

"I suppose the money is not all there," suggested Mr. Wilson.

"There's a queer story going about as to some diamonds. No one knows whom
they belong to, and they say that Fawn has accused her of stealing them.
He wants to get hold of them, and she won't give them up. I believe the
lawyers are to have a shy at it. I'm sorry for Fawn. It'll do him a deal
of mischief."

"You'll find he won't come out much amiss," said Mr. Legge Wilson. "He's
as cautious a man as there is in London. If there is anything wrong----"

"There's a great deal wrong," said Barrington Erle.

"You'll find it will be on her side."

"And you'll find also that she'll contrive that all the blame shall lie
upon him. She's clever enough for anything! Who's to be the new bishop?"

"I have not heard Gresham say as yet; Jones, I should think," said Mr.
Wilson.

"And who is Jones?"

"A clergyman, I suppose, of the safe sort. I don't know that anything else
is necessary." From which it will be seen that Mr. Wilson had his own
opinion about church matters, and also that people very high up in the
world were concerning themselves about poor Lizzie's affairs.

Lady Eustace did go to Lady Glencora's evening party, in spite of Mr.
Camperdown and all her difficulties. Lady Chiltern had been quite right in
saying that Lizzie was not the woman to show the white feather. She went,
knowing that she would meet Lord Fawn, and she did wear the diamonds. It
was the first time that they had been round her neck since the occasion in
respect to which Sir Florian had placed them in her hands, and it had not
been without much screwing up of her courage that she had resolved to
appear on this occasion with the much talked-of ornament upon her person.
It was now something over a fortnight since she had parted with Lord Fawn
at Fawn Court; and, although they were still presumed to be engaged to
marry each other, and were both living in London, she had not seen him
since. A sort of message had reached her, through Frank Greystock, to the
effect that Lord Fawn thought it as well that they should not meet till
the matter was settled. Stipulations had been made by Frank on her behalf,
and this had been inserted among them. She had received the message with
scorn--with a mixture of scorn and gratitude--of scorn in regard to the
man who had promised to marry her, and of affectionate gratitude to the
cousin who had made the arrangement. "Of course I shall not wish to see
him while he chooses to entertain such an idea," she had said, "but I
shall not keep out of his way. You would not wish me to keep out of his
way, Frank?" When she received a card for Lady Glencora's party, very soon
after this, she was careful to answer it in such a manner as to impress
Lady Glencora with a remembrance of her assent. Lord Fawn would probably
be there, unless he remained away in order to avoid her. Then she had ten
days in which to make up her mind as to wearing the diamonds. Her courage
was good; but then her ignorance was so great! She did not know whether
Mr. Camperdown might not contrive to have them taken by violence from her
neck, even on Lady Glencora's stairs. Her best security, so she thought,
would be in the fact that Mr. Camperdown would not know of her purpose.
She told no one, not even Miss Macnulty, but she appeared before that
lady, arrayed in all her beauty, just as she was about to descend to her
carriage.

"You've got the necklace on!" said Miss Macnulty.

"Why should I not wear my own necklace?" she asked, with assumed anger.

Lady Glencora's rooms were already very full when Lizzie entered them, but
she was without a gentleman, and room was made for her to pass quickly up
the stairs. The diamonds had been recognised by many before she had
reached the drawing-room; not that these very diamonds were known, or that
there was a special memory for that necklace; but the subject had been so
generally discussed, that the blaze of the stones immediately brought it
to the minds of men and women. "There she is, with poor Eustace's twenty
thousand pounds round her neck," said Laurence Fitzgibbon to his friend
Barrington Erle. "And there is Lord Fawn going to look after them,"
replied the other.

Lord Fawn thought it right, at any rate, to look after his bride. Lady
Glencora had whispered into his ear before they went down to dinner that
Lady Eustace would be there in the evening, so that he might have the
option of escaping or remaining. Could he have escaped without any one
knowing that he had escaped, he would not have gone up-stairs after
dinner; but he knew that he was observed; he knew that people were talking
about him; and he did not like it to be said that he had run away. He went
up, thinking much of it all, and as soon as he saw Lady Eustace he made
his way to her and accosted her. Many eyes were upon them, but no ear
probably heard how infinitely unimportant were the words which they spoke
to each other. Her manner was excellent. She smiled and gave him her hand
--just her hand without the slightest pressure--and spoke a half-whispered
word, looking into his face, but betraying nothing by her look. Then he
asked her whether she would dance. Yes; she would stand up for a
quadrille; and they did stand up for a quadrille. As she danced with no
one else, it was clear that she treated Lord Fawn as her lover. As soon as
the dance was done she took his arm and moved for a few minutes about the
room with him. She was very conscious of the diamonds, but she did not
show the feeling in her face. He also was conscious of them, and he did
show it. He did not recognise the necklace, but he knew well that this was
the very bone of contention. They were very beautiful, and seemed to him
to outshine all other jewelry in the room. And Lady Eustace was a woman of
whom it might almost be said that she ought to wear diamonds. She was made
to sparkle, to be bright with outside garniture--to shine and glitter, and
be rich in apparel. The only doubt might be whether paste diamonds might
not better suit her character. But these were not paste, and she did shine
and glitter and was very rich. It must not be brought as an accusation
against Lady Glencora's guests that they pressed round to look at the
necklace. Lady Glencora's guests knew better than to do that. But there
was some slight ferment--slight, but still felt both by Lord Fawn and by
Lady Eustace. Eyes were turned upon the diamonds, and there were whispers
here and there. Lizzie bore it very well; but Lord Fawn was uncomfortable.

"I like her for wearing them," said Lady Glencora to Lady Chiltern.

"Yes--if she means to keep them. I don't pretend, however, to know
anything about it. You see the match isn't off."

"I suppose not. What do you think I did? He dined here, you know, and,
before going down-stairs, I told him that she was coming. I thought it
only fair."

"And what did he say?"

"I took care that he shouldn't have to say anything; but, to tell the
truth, I didn't expect him to come up."

"There can't be any quarrel at all," said Lady Chiltern.

"I'm not sure of that," said Lady Glencora. "They are not so very loving."

Lady Eustace made the most of her opportunity. Soon after the quadrille
was over she asked Lord Fawn to get her carriage for her. Of course he got
it, and of course he put her into it, passing up and down stairs twice in
his efforts on her behalf. And of course all the world saw what he was
doing. Up to the last moment not a word had been spoken between them that
might not have passed between the most ordinary acquaintance; but, as she
took her seat, she put her face forward and did say a word. "You had
better come to me soon," she said.

"I will," said Lord Fawn.

"Yes; you had better come soon. All this is wearing me--perhaps more than
you think."

"I will come soon," said Lord Fawn, and then he returned among Lady
Glencora's guests, very uncomfortable. Lizzie got home in safety and
locked up her diamonds in the iron box.




CHAPTER XVIII

AND I HAVE NOTHING TO GIVE


It was now the end of June, and Frank Greystock had been as yet but once
at Fawn Court since he had written to Lucy Morris asking her to be his
wife. That was three weeks since, and as the barrier against him at Fawn
Court had been removed by Lady Fawn herself, the Fawn girls thought that
as a lover he was very slack; but Lucy was not in the least annoyed. Lucy
knew that it was all right; for Frank, as he took his last walk round the
shrubbery with her during that visit, had given her to understand that
there was a little difference between him and Lady Fawn in regard to
Lizzie Eustace. "I am her only relative in London," Frank had said.

"Lady Linlithgow," suggested Lucy.

"They have quarrelled, and the old woman is as bitter as gall. There is no
one else to stand up for her, and I must see that she isn't ill-used.
Women do hate each other so virulently, and Lady Fawn hates her future
daughter-in-law." Lucy did not in the least grudge her lover's assistance
to his cousin. There was nothing of jealousy in her feeling. She thought
that Lizzie was unworthy of Frank's goodness, but on such an occasion as
this she would not say so. She told him nothing of the bribe that had been
offered her, nor on that subject had she said a word to any of the Fawns.
She understood, too, that as Frank had declared his purpose of supporting
Lizzie, it might be as well that he should see just at present as little
of Lady Fawn as possible. Not a word, however, had Lady Fawn said to Lucy
disparaging her lover for his conduct. It was quite understood now at Fawn
Court, by all the girls, and no doubt by the whole establishment, that
Lizzie Eustace was to be regarded as an enemy. It was believed by them all
that Lord Fawn had broken off the match--or, at least, that he was
resolved to break it; but various stratagems were to be used, and terrible
engines of war were to be brought up if necessary, to prevent an alliance
which was now thought to be disreputable. Mrs. Hittaway had been hard at
work, and had found out something very like truth in regard to the whole
transaction with Mr. Benjamin. Perhaps Mrs. Hittaway had found out more
than was quite true as to poor Lizzie's former sins; but what she did find
out she used with all her skill, communicating her facts to her mother, to
Mr. Camperdown, and to her brother. Her brother had almost quarrelled with
her, but still she continued to communicate her facts.

At this period Frank Greystock was certainly somewhat unreasonable in
reference to his cousin. At one time, as the reader will remember, he had
thought of asking her to be his wife--because she was rich; but even then
he had not thought well of her, had hardly believed her to be honest, and
had rejoiced when he found that circumstances rather than his own judgment
had rescued him from that evil. He had professed to be delighted when Lord
Fawn was accepted--as being happy to think that his somewhat dangerous
cousin was provided with so safe a husband; and, when he had first heard
of the necklace, he had expressed an opinion that of course it would be
given up. In all this then he had shown no strong loyalty to his cousin,
no very dear friendship, nothing to make those who knew him feel that he
would buckle on armour in her cause. But of late--and that, too, since his
engagement with Lucy--he had stood up very stoutly as her friend, and the
armour was being buckled on. He had not scrupled to say that he meant to
see her through this business with Lord Fawn, and had somewhat astonished
Mr. Camperdown by raising a doubt on the question of the necklace.

"He can't but know that she has no more right to it than I have," Mr.
Camperdown had said to his son with indignation. Mr. Camperdown was
becoming unhappy about the necklace, not quite knowing how to proceed in
the matter.

In the mean time Frank had obeyed his better instincts, and had asked Lucy
Morris to be his wife. He had gone to Fawn Court in compliance with a
promise to Lizzie Eustace that he would call upon her there. He had walked
with Lucy because he was at Fawn Court. And he had written to Lucy because
of the words he had spoken during the walk. In all this the matter had
arranged itself as such matters do, and there was nothing, in truth, to be
regretted. He really did love the girl with all his heart. It may,
perhaps, be said that he had never in truth loved any other woman. In the
best humours of his mind he would tell himself--had from old times told
himself often--that unless he married Lucy Morris he could never marry at
all. When his mother, knowing that poor Lucy was penniless, had, as
mothers will do, begged him to beware, he had spoken up for his love
honestly, declaring to her that in his eyes there was no woman living
equal to Lucy Morris. The reader has seen him with the words almost on his
tongue with which to offer his hand to his cousin, Lizzie Eustace, knowing
as he did so that his heart had been given to Lucy--knowing also that
Lucy's heart had been given to him! But he had not done it, and the better
humour had prevailed.

Within the figure and frame and clothes and cuticle, within the bones and
flesh of many of us, there is but one person, a man or woman, with a
preponderance either of good or evil, whose conduct in any emergency may
be predicted with some assurance of accuracy by any one knowing the man or
woman. Such persons are simple, single, and perhaps generally safe. They
walk along lines in accordance with certain fixed instincts or principles,
and are to-day as they were yesterday, and will be to-morrow as they are
to-day. Lady Eustace was such a person, and so was Lucy Morris. Opposite
in their characters as the two poles, they were each of them a simple
entity; and any doubt or error in judging of the future conduct of either
of them would come from insufficient knowledge of the woman. But there are
human beings who, though of necessity single in body, are dual in
character; in whose breasts not only is evil always fighting against good,
but to whom evil is sometimes horribly, hideously evil, but is sometimes
also not hideous at all. Of such men it may be said that Satan obtains an
intermittent grasp, from which, when it is released, the rebound carries
them high amid virtuous resolutions and a thorough love of things good and
noble. Such men or women may hardly perhaps debase themselves with the
more vulgar vices. They will not be rogues, or thieves, or drunkards, or
perhaps liars; but ambition, luxury, self-indulgence, pride, and
covetousness will get a hold of them, and in various moods will be to them
virtues in lieu of vices. Such a man was Frank Greystock, who could walk
along the banks of the quiet, trout-giving Bob, at Bobsborough, whipping
the river with his rod, telling himself that the world lost for love would
be a bad thing well lost for a fine purpose; and who could also stand,
with his hands in his trousers pockets, looking down upon the pavement, in
the purlieus of the courts at Westminster, and swear to himself that he
would win the game, let the cost to his heart be what it might. What must
a man be who would allow some undefined feeling, some inward ache which he
calls a passion and cannot analyse, some desire which has come of instinct
and not of judgment, to interfere with all the projects of his intellect,
with all the work which he has laid out for his accomplishment?
Circumstances had thrown him into a path of life for which, indeed, his
means were insufficient, but which he regarded as of all paths the noblest
and the manliest. If he could be true to himself--with such truth as at
these moments would seem to him to be the truest truth--there was nothing
in rank, nothing in ambition, which might not be within his reach. He
might live with the highest, and best-educated, and the most beautiful; he
might assist in directing national councils by his intelligence; and might
make a name for himself which should be remembered in his country, and of
which men would read the records in the histories written in after ages.
But to do this he must walk warily. He, an embarrassed man, a man already
in debt, a man with no realised property coming to him in reversion, was
called upon to live, and to live as though at his ease, among those who
had been born to wealth. And, indeed, he had so cleverly learned the ways
of the wealthy that he hardly knew any longer how to live at his ease
among the poor.

But had he walked warily when he went down to Richmond, and afterward,
sitting alone in the obscurity of his chamber, wrote the letter which had
made Lucy Morris so happy? It must be acknowledged that he did in truth
love the girl--that he was capable of a strong feeling. She was not
beautiful, hardly even pretty, small, in appearance almost insignificant,
quite penniless, a governess! He had often asked himself what it was that
had so vanquished him. She always wore a pale grey frock, with perhaps a
grey ribbon, never running into any bright form of clothing. She was
educated, very well educated; but she owned no great accomplishment. She
had not sung his heart away or ravished him with the harp. Even of her
words she was sparing, seeming to care more to listen than to speak; a
humble little thing to look at--one of whom you might say that she
regarded herself as well-placed if left in the background. Yet he had
found her out and knew her. He had recognised the treasure, and had
greatly desired to possess it. He had confessed to himself that, could
splendour and ambition be laid aside, that little thing would be all the
world to him. As he sat in court or in the House, patient from practice as
he half-listened to the ponderous speeches of advocates or politicians, he
would think of the sparkle in her eye, of the dimple in her chin, or the
lines of the mouth which could plead so eloquently, though with few words.
To sit on some high seat among his countrymen and also to marry Lucy
Morris, that would be a high ambition. He had chosen his way now, and she
was engaged to be his wife.

As he thought of it after he had done it, it was not all happiness, all
contentment with him. He did feel that he had crippled himself--impeded
himself in running the race, as it were with a log round his leg. He had
offered to marry her, and he must do so at once, or almost at once,
because she could now find no other home but his. He knew, as well as did
Lady Fawn, that she could not go into another family as governess; and he
knew also that she ought not to remain in Lady Fawn's house an hour longer
than she should be wanted there. He must alter his plan of living at once,
give up the luxury of his rooms at the Grosvenor, take a small house
somewhere, probably near the Swiss Cottage, come up and down to his
chambers by the underground railway, and in all probability abandon
Parliament altogether. He was not sure whether in good faith he should not
at once give notice of his intended acceptance of the Chiltern Hundreds to
the electors of Bobsborough. Thus meditating, under the influence of that
intermittent evil grasp, almost angry with himself for the open truth
which he had spoken, or rather written, and perhaps thinking more of
Lizzie and her beauty than he should have done, in the course of three
weeks he had paid but one visit to Fawn Court. Then, of a sudden, finding
himself one afternoon relieved from work, he resolved to go there. The
days were still almost at their longest, and he did not scruple to present
himself before Lady Fawn between eight and nine in the evening. They were
all at tea, and he was welcomed kindly. Lucy, when he was announced, at
once got up and met him almost at the doorway, sparkling with just a tear
of joy in her eye, with a look in her face and a loving manner which for
the moment made him sure that the little house near the Swiss Cottage
would, after all, be the only Elysium upon earth. If she spoke a word he
hardly heard it, but her hand was in his, so cool and soft, almost
trembling in its grasp, with no attempt to withdraw itself, frank, loving,
and honest. There was a perfect satisfaction in her greeting which at once
told him that she had no discontented thoughts--had had no such thoughts--
because he had been so long without coming. To see him was a great joy.
But every hour of her life was a joy to her, knowing, as she did know,
that he loved her.

Lady Fawn was gracious, the girls were hospitable, and he found himself
made very welcome amidst all the women at the tea-table. Not a word was
said about Lizzie Eustace. Lady Fawn talked about Parliament, and
professed to pity a poor lover who was so bound to his country that he
could not see his mistress above once a fortnight. "But there'll be a good
time coming next month," she said; for it was now July. "Though the girls
can't make their claims felt, the grouse can."

"It isn't the House altogether that rules me with a rod of iron, Lady
Fawn," said Frank, "but the necessity of earning daily bread by the sweat
of my brow. A man who has to sit in court all day must take the night--or,
indeed, any time that he can get--to read up his cases."

"But the grouse put a stop to all work," said Lady Fawn. "My gardener told
me just now that he wanted a day or two in August. I don't doubt but that
he is going to the moors. Are you going to the moors, Mr. Greystock?"

As it happened, Frank Greystock did not quite know whether he was going to
the moors or not. The Ayrshire grouse-shooting is not the best in
Scotland; but there is grouse-shooting in Ayrshire; and the shooting on
the Portray mountains is not the worst shooting in the county. The castle
at Portray overhangs the sea, but there is a wild district attached to it
stretching far back inland, in regard to which Lizzie Eustace was very
proud of talking of "her shooting." Early in the spring of the present
year she had asked her cousin Frank to accept the shooting for the coming
season, and he had accepted it. "I shall probably be abroad," she said,
"but there is the old castle." She had offered it as though he had been
her brother, and he had said that he would go down for a couple of weeks--
not to the castle, but to a little lodge some miles up from the sea, of
which she told him when he declined the castle. When this invitation was
given there was no engagement between her and Lord Fawn. Since that date,
within the last day or two, she had reminded him of it.

"Won't his lordship be there?" he had said laughingly.

"Certainly not," she had answered with serious earnestness. Then she had
explained that her plan of going abroad had been set aside by
circumstances. She did mean to go down to Portray. "I couldn't have you at
the castle," she said, smiling; "but even an Othello couldn't object to a
first cousin at a little cottage ever so many miles off." It wasn't for
him to suggest what objections might rise to the brain of a modern
Othello; but after some hesitation he said that he would be there. He had
promised the trip to a friend, and would like to keep his promise. But,
nevertheless, he almost thought that he ought to avoid Portray. He
intended to support his cousin as far as he might do so honestly; but he
was not quite minded to stand by her through good report and evil report.
He did not desire to be specially known as her champion, and yet he felt
that that position would be almost forced upon him. He foresaw danger, and
consequently he was doubting about his journey to Scotland.

"I hardly know whether I am or not," said Frank, and he almost felt that
he was blushing.

"I hope you are," said Lucy. "When a man has to work all day and nearly
all night, he should go where he may get fresh air."

"There's very good air without going to Scotland for it," said Lady Fawn,
who kept up an excellent house at Richmond, but who, with all her
daughters, could not afford autumn trips. The Fawns lived at Fawn Court
all the year round, and consequently Lady Fawn thought that air was to be
found in England sufficiently good for all purposes of vitality and
recreation.

"It's not quite the same thing," said Lucy; "at least, not for a man."

After that she was allowed to escape into the grounds with her lover, and
was made happy with half an hour of unalloyed bliss. To be alone with the
girl to whom he is not engaged is a man's delight; to be alone with the
man to whom she is engaged is the woman's. When the thing is settled there
is always present to the man something of a feeling of clipped wings;
whereas the woman is conscious of a new power of expanding her pinions.
The certainty of the thing is to him repressive. He has done his work, and
gained his victory, and by conquering has become a slave. To her the
certainty of the thing is the removal of a restraint which has hitherto
always been on her. She can tell him everything, and be told everything,
whereas her previous confidences, made with those of her own sex, have
been tame and by comparison valueless. He has no new confidence to make,
unless when he comes to tell her he likes his meat well done, and wants
his breakfast to be punctual. Lucy now not only promised herself, but did
actually realise, a great joy. He seemed to be to her all that her heart
desired. He was a man whose manner was naturally caressing and
demonstrative, and she was to him, of all women, the sweetest, the
dearest, the most perfect, and all his own. "But, Frank"--she had already
been taught to call him Frank when they were alone together--"what will
come of all this about Lizzie Eustace?"

"They will be married, of course."

"Do you think so? I am sure Lady Fawn doesn't think so."

"What Lady Fawn thinks on such a matter cannot be helped. When a man asks
a woman to marry him, and she accepts, the natural consequence is that
they will be married. Don't you think so?"

"I hope so, sometimes," said Lucy, with her two hands joined upon his arm,
and hanging to it with all her little weight.

"You really do hope it?" he said.

"Oh, I do; you know I do. Hope it! I should die if I didn't hope it."

"Then why shouldn't she?" He asked his question with a quick, sharp voice,
and then turned upon her for an answer.

"I don't know," she said, very softly, and still clinging to him. "I
sometimes think there is a difference in people."

"There is a difference; but, still, we hardly judge of people sufficiently
by our own feelings. As she accepted him, you may be sure that she wishes
to marry him. She has more to give than he has."

"And I have nothing to give," she said.

"If I thought so, I'd go back even now," he answered. "It is because you
have so much to give--so much more than most others--that I have thought
of you, dreamed of you as my wife, almost ever since I first knew you."

"I have nothing left to give," she said. "What I ever had is all given.
People call it the heart. I think it is heart, and brain, and mind, and
body, and almost soul. But, Frank, though Lizzie Eustace is your cousin, I
don't want to be likened to her. She is very clever, and beautiful, and
has a way with her that I know is charming--"

"But what, Lucy?"

"I don't think she cares so much as some people. I dare say she likes Lord
Fawn very well, but I do not believe she loves him as I love you."

"They're engaged," said Frank, "and the best thing they can do is to marry
each other. I can tell you this at any rate,"--and his manner again became
serious--"if Lord Fawn behaves ill to her, I, as her cousin, shall take
her part."

"You don't mean that you'll--fight him!"

"No, my darling. Men don't fight each other nowadays--not often, at least
--and Fawn and I are not of the fighting sort. I can make him understand
what I mean and what others will mean without fighting him. He is making a
paltry excuse."

"But why should he want to excuse himself--without reason?"

"Because he is afraid. People have got hold of him and told him lies, and
he thinks there will be a scrape about this necklace, and he hates a
scrape. He'll marry her at last, without a doubt, and Lady Fawn is only
making trouble for herself by trying to prevent it. You can't do
anything."

"Oh no--I can't do anything. When she was here it became at last quite
disagreeable. She hardly spoke to them, and I'm sure that even the
servants understood that there was a quarrel." She did not say a word of
Lizzie's offer of the brooch to herself, nor of the stories which by
degrees were reaching her ears as to the old debts, and the diamonds, and
the young bride's conduct to Lady Linlithgow as soon as she married her
grand husband, Sir Florian. She did think badly of Lizzie, and could not
but regret that her own noble, generous Frank should have to expend his
time and labour on a friend unworthy of his friendship; but there was no
shade of jealousy in her feeling, and she uttered no word against Lizzie
more bitter than that in which she declared that there was a difference
between people.

And then there was something said as to their own prospects in life. Lucy
at once and with vehemence declared that she did not look for or expect an
immediate marriage. She did not scruple to tell him that she knew well how
difficult was the task before him, and that it might be essential for his
interest that he should remain as he was for a year or two. He was
astonished to find how completely she understood his position, and how
thoroughly she sympathised with his interests. "There is only one thing I
couldn't do for you," she said.

"And what is the one thing?"

"I couldn't give you up. I almost thought that I ought to refuse you
because I can do nothing--nothing to help you. But there will always come
a limit to self-denial. I couldn't do that! Could I?"

The reader will know how this question was answered, and will not want to
be told of the long, close, clinging, praiseworthy kiss with which the
young barrister assured her that would have been on her part an act of
self-denial which would to him have been absolutely ruinous. It was
agreed, however, between them, that Lady Fawn should be told that they did
not propose to marry till some time in the following year, and that she
should be formally asked to allow Lucy to have a home at Fawn Court in the
interval.




CHAPTER XIX

AS MY BROTHER


Lord Fawn had promised, as he put Lizzie into her carriage, that he would
come to her soon--but he did not come soon. A fortnight passed and he did
not show himself. Nothing further had been done in the matter of the
diamonds, except that Mr. Camperdown had written to Frank Greystock,
explaining how impossible it was that the question of their possession
should be referred to arbitration. According to him they belonged to the
heir, as did the estate; and no one would have the power of accepting an
arbitration respecting them--an arbitration which might separate them from
the estate of which an infant was the owner for his life--any more than
such arbitration could be accepted as to the property of the estate
itself. "Possession is nine points of the law," said Frank to himself, as
he put the letter aside--thinking at the same time that possession in the
hands of Lizzie Eustace included certainly every one of those nine points.
Lizzie wore her diamonds again and then again. There may be a question
whether the possession of the necklace and the publicity of its history--
which, however, like many other histories, was most inaccurately told--did
not add something to her reputation as a lady of fashion. In the mean time
Lord Fawn did not come to see her. So she wrote to him. "My dear Frederic:
Had you not better come to me? Yours affectionately, L. I go to the North
at the end of this month."

But Frank Greystock did visit her, more than once. On the day after the
above letter was written he came to her. It was on Sunday afternoon, when
July was more than half over, and he found her alone. Miss Macnulty had
gone to church, and Lizzie was lying listlessly on a sofa with a volume of
poetry in her hand. She had, in truth, been reading the book, and in her
way enjoying it. It told her the story of certain knights of old, who had
gone forth in quest of a sign from heaven, which sign, if verily seen by
them, might be taken to signify that they themselves were esteemed holy,
and fit for heavenly joy. One would have thought that no theme could have
been less palatable to such a one as Lizzie Eustace; but the melody of the
lines had pleased her ear, and she was always able to arouse for herself a
false enthusiasm on things which were utterly outside herself in life. She
thought she too could have travelled in search of that holy sign, and have
borne all things, and abandoned all things, and have persevered, and of a
certainty have been rewarded. But as for giving up a string of diamonds,
in common honesty, that was beyond her.

"I wonder whether men ever were like that?" she said, as she allowed her
cousin to take the book from her hands.

"Let us hope not."

"Oh, Frank!"

"They were, no doubt, as fanatic and foolish as you please. If you will
read to the end----"

"I have read it all, every word of it," said Lizzie, enthusiastically.

"Then you know that Arthur did not go on the search, because he had a job
of work to do, by the doing of which the people around him might perhaps
be somewhat benefited."

"I like Launcelot better than Arthur," said Lizzie.

"So did the Queen," replied Frank.

"Your useful, practical man, who attends vestries and sits at boards, and
measures out his gifts to others by the ounce, never has any heart. Has
he, Frank?"

"I don't know what heart means. I sometimes fancy that it is a talent for
getting into debt, and running away with other men's wives."

"You say that on purpose to make me quarrel with you. You don't run away
with other men's wives, and you have heart."

"But I get into debt, unfortunately; and as for other men's wives, I am
not sure that I may not do even that some day. Has Lord Fawn been here?"
She shook her head. "Or written?" Again she shook her head. As she did so
the long curl waved and was very near to him, for he was sitting close to
the sofa, and she had raised herself so that she might look into his face
and speak to him almost in a whisper. "Something should be settled,
Lizzie, before you leave town."

"I wrote to him yesterday, one line, and desired him to come. I expected
him here to-day, but you have come instead. Shall I say that I am
disappointed?"

"No doubt you are so."

"Oh, Frank, how vain you men are! You want me to swear to you that I would
sooner have you with me than him. You are not content with--thinking it,
unless I tell you that it is so. You know that it is so. Though he is to
be my husband--I suppose he will be my husband--his spirit is not
congenial to mine, as is yours."

"Had you not loved him you would not have accepted him."

"What was I to do, Frank? What am I to do? Think how desolate I am, how
unfriended, how much in want of some one whom I can call a protector! I
cannot have you always with me. You care more for the little finger of
that prim piece of propriety down at the old dowager's than you do for me
and all my sorrows." This was true, but Frank did not say that it was
true. "Lord Fawn is at any rate respectable. At least I thought he was so
when I accepted his offer."

"He is respectable enough."

"Just that--isn't it?--and nothing more You do not blame me for saying
that I would be his wife? If you do, I will unsay it, let it cost me what
it may. He is treating me so badly that I need not go far for an excuse."
Then she looked into his face with all the eagerness of her gaze, clearly
implying that she expected a serious answer. "Why do you not answer me,
Frank?"

"What am I to say? He is a timid, cautious man. They have frightened him
about this trumpery necklace, and he is behaving badly. But he will make a
good husband. He is not a spendthrift. He has rank. All his people are
respectable. As Lady Fawn any house in England will be open to you. He is
not rich, but together you will be rich."

"What is all that without love?"

"I do not doubt his love. And when you are his own he will love you
dearly."

"Ah, yes; as he would a horse or a picture. Is there anything of the
rapture of love in that? Is that your idea of love? Is it so you love your
Miss Demure?"

"Don't call names, Lizzie."

"I shall say what I please of her. You and I are to be friends, and I may
not speak? No; I will have no such friendship! She is demure. If you like
it, what harm is there in my saying it? I am not demure. I know that. I do
not, at least, pretend to be other than I am. When she becomes your wife,
I wonder whether you will like her ways?" He had not yet told her that she
was to be his wife, nor did he so tell her now. He thought for a moment
the he had better tell her, but he did not do so. It would, he said to
himself, add an embarrassment to his present position. And as the marriage
was to be postponed for a year, it might be better, perhaps, for Lucy that
it should not be declared openly. It was thus he argued with himself, but
yet, no doubt, he knew well that he did not declare the truth because it
would take away something of its sweetness from this friendship with his
cousin Lizzie.

"If I ever do marry," he said, "I hope I shall like my wife's ways."

"Of course you will not tell me anything. I do not expect confidence from
you. I do not think a man is ever able to work himself up to the mark of
true confidence with his friend. Men together, when they like each other,
talk of politics, or perhaps of money; but I doubt whether they ever
really tell their thoughts and longings to each other."

"Are women more communicative?"

"Yes; certainly. What is there I would not tell you if you. cared to hear
it? Every thought I have is open to you if you choose to read it. I have
that feeling regarding you that I would keep nothing back from you. Oh,
Frank, if you understood me, you could save me--I was going to say--from
all unhappiness."

She did it so well that he would have been more than man had he not
believed some of it. She was sitting almost upright now, though her feet
were still on the sofa, and was leaning over towards him, as though
imploring him for his aid, and her eyes were full of tears, and her lips
were apart as though still eager with the energy of expression, and her
hands were clasped together. She was very lovely, very attractive, almost
invincible. For such a one as Frank Greystock opposition to her in her
present mood was impossible. There are men by whom a woman, if she have
wit, beauty, and no conscience, cannot be withstood. Arms may be used
against them, and a sort of battle waged, against which they can raise no
shield--from which they can retire into no fortress--in which they can
parry no blow. A man so weak and so attacked may sometimes run; but even
the poor chance of running is often cut off from him. How unlike she was
to Lucy! He believed her--in part; and yet that was the idea that occurred
to him. When Lucy was much in earnest, in her eye, too, a tear would
sparkle, the smallest drop, a bright liquid diamond that never fell; and
all her face would be bright and eloquent with feeling; but how unlike
were the two! He knew that the difference was that between truth and
falsehood; and yet he partly believed the falsehood. "If I knew how to
save you from an hour's uneasiness, I would do it," he said.

"No--no--no!" she murmured.

"Would I not? You do not know me then." He had nothing further to say, and
it suited her to remain silent for the moment, while she dried her eyes
and recovered her composure, and prepared herself to carry on the battle
with a smile. She would carry on the battle, using every wile she knew,
straining every nerve to be victorious, encountering any and all dangers,
and yet she had no definite aim before her. She herself did not know what
she would be at. At this period of her career she did not want to marry
her cousin--having resolved that she would be Lady Fawn. Nor did she
intend that her cousin should be her lover--in the ordinary sense of love.
She was far too wary in the pursuit of the world's goods to sacrifice
herself to any such wish as that. She did want him to help her about the
diamonds; but such help as that she might have, as she knew well, on much
easier terms. There was probably an anxiety in her bosom to cause him to
be untrue to Lucy Morris; but the guiding motive of her conduct was the
desire to make things seem to be other than they were. To be always acting
a part rather than living her own life was to her everything. "After all
we must come to facts," he said, after a while. "I suppose it will be
better that you should marry Lord Fawn."

"If you wish it."

"Nay; I cannot have that said. In this matter you must rule yourself by
your own judgment. If you are averse to it----" She shook her head. "Then
you will own that it had better be so." Again she shook her head. "Lizzie,
for your sake and my own, I must declare that if you have no opinion in
this matter, neither will I have any. You shall never have to say that I
pressed you into this marriage or debarred you from marrying. I could not
bear such an accusation."

"But you might tell me what I ought to do."

"No; certainly not."

"Think how young I am, and--by comparison--how old you are. You are eight
years older than I am. Remember, after all that I have gone through, I am
but twenty-two. At my age other girls have their friends to tell them. I
have no one, unless you will tell me."

"You have accepted him?"

"Yes."

"I suppose he is not altogether indifferent to you?"

She paused, and again shook her head. "Indeed I do not know. If you mean,
do I love him, as I could love some man whose heart was quite congenial to
my own, certainly I do not." She continued to shake her head very sadly.
"I esteemed him--when he asked me."

"Say at once that, having made up your mind, you will go through with it."

"You think that I ought?"

"You think so--yourself."

"So be it, Frank. I will. But, Frank, I will not give up my property. You
do not wish me to do that. It would be weak now--would it not? I am sure
that it is my own."

"His faith to you should not depend on that."

"No, of course not; that is just what I mean. He can have no right to
interfere. When he asked me to be his wife, he said nothing about that.
But if he does not come to me, what shall I do?"

"I suppose I had better see him," said Frank slowly.

"Will you? That will be so good of you. I feel that I can leave it all
safely in your hands. I shall go out of town, you know, on the 30th. I
feel that I shall be better away, and I am sick of all the noise, and
glitter, and worldliness of London. You will come on the 12th?"

"Not quite so soon as that," he said, after a pause.

"But you will come?"

"Yes; about the 20th."

"And of course, I shall see you?"

"Oh, yes."

"So that I may have some one to guide me that I can trust. I have no
brother, Frank; do you ever think of that?" She put out her hand to him,
and he clasped it, and held it tight in his own; and then, after a while,
he pulled her towards him. In a moment she was on the ground, kneeling at
his feet, and his arm was round her shoulder, and his hand was on her
back, and he was embracing her. Her face was turned up to him, and he
pressed his lips upon her forehead. "As my brother," she said, stretching
back her head and looking up into his face.

"Yes; as your brother."

They were sitting, or rather acting their little play together, in the
back drawing-room, and the ordinary entrance to the two rooms was from the
landing-place into the larger apartment; of which fact Lizzie was probably
aware, when she permitted herself to fall into a position as to which a
moment or two might be wanted for recovery. When, therefore, the servant
in livery opened the door, which he did as Frank thought somewhat
suddenly, she was able to be standing on her legs before she was caught.
The quickness with which she sprung from her position, and the facility
with which she composed not her face only, but the loose lock of her hair
and all her person, for the reception of the coming visitor, was quite
marvellous. About her there was none of the look of having been found out,
which is so very disagreeable to the wearer of it; whereas Frank, when
Lord Fawn was announced, was aware that his manner was awkward, and his
general appearance flurried. Lizzie was no more flurried than if she had
stepped that moment from out of the hands of her tirewoman. She greeted
Lord Fawn very prettily, holding him by the hand long enough to show that
she had more claim to do so than could any other woman, and then she just
murmured her cousin's name. The two men shook hands, and looked at each
other as men who know they are not friends, and think that they may live
to be enemies. Lord Fawn, who rarely forgot anything, had certainly not
forgotten the Sawab; and Frank was aware that he might soon be called on
to address his lordship in anything but friendly terms. They said,
however, a few words about Parliament and the weather, and the
desirability of escaping from London.

"Frank," said Lady Eustace, "is coming down in August to shoot my three
annual grouse at Portray. He would keep one for you, my lord, if he
thought you would come for it."

"I'll promise Lord Fawn a fair third at any rate," said Frank.

"I cannot visit Portray this August, I'm afraid," said his lordship, "much
as I might wish to do so. One of us must remain at the India Office----"

"Oh, that weary India Office!" exclaimed "Lizzie.

"I almost think that you official men are worse off than we barristers,"
said Frank. "Well, Lizzie, good-by. I dare say I shall see you again
before you start."

"Of course you will," said Lizzie. And then the two lovers were left
together. They had met once, at Lady Glencora's ball, since the quarrel at
Fawn Court, and there, as though by mutual forbearance, had not alluded to
their troubles. Now he had come especially to speak of the matter that
concerned them both so deeply. As long as Frank Greystock was in the room
his work was comparatively easy, but he had known beforehand that he would
not find it all easy should he be left alone with her. Lizzie began. "My
lord," she said, "considering all that has passed between us you have been
a truant."

"Yes; I admit it--but----"

"With me, my lord, a fault admitted is a fault forgiven." Then she took
her old seat on the sofa, and he placed himself on the chair which Frank
Greystock had occupied. He had not intended to own a fault, and certainly
not to accept forgiveness; but she had been too quick for him; and now he
could not find words by which to express himself. "In truth," she
continued, "I would always rather remember one kindness than a dozen
omissions on the part of a friend."

"Lady Eustace, I have not willingly omitted anything."

"So be it. I will not give you the slightest excuse for saying that you
have heard a reproach from me. You have come at last, and you are welcome.
Is that enough for you?"

He had much to say to her about the diamonds, and when he was entering the
room he had not a word to say to her about anything else. Since that
another subject had sprung up before him. Whether he was or was not to
regard himself as being at this moment engaged to marry Lady Eustace, was
a matter to him of much doubt; but of this he was sure, that if she were
engaged to him as his wife, she ought not to be entertaining her cousin
Frank Greystock down at Portray Castle unless she had some old lady, not
only respectable in life but high in rank also, to see that everything was
right. It was almost an insult to him that such a visit should have been
arranged without his sanction or cognisance. Of course, if he were bound
by no engagement--and he had been persuaded by his mother and sister to
wish that he were not bound--then the matter would be no affair of his.
If, however, the diamonds were abandoned, then the engagement was to be
continued: and in that case it was out of the question that his elected
bride should entertain another young man, even though she was a widow and
the young man was her cousin. Of course he should have spoken of the
diamonds first; but the other matter had obtruded itself upon him, and he
was puzzled. "Is Mr. Greystock to accompany you into Scotland?" he asked.

"Oh dear, no. I go on the 30th of this month. I hardly know when he means
to be there."

"He follows you to Portray?"

"Yes; he follows me of course. 'The king himself has followed her, when
she has gone before.'" Lord Fawn did not remember the quotation, and was
more puzzled than ever. "Frank will follow me, just as the other shooting
men will follow me."

"He goes direct to Portray Castle?"

"Neither directly nor indirectly. Just at present, Lord Fawn I am in no
mood to entertain guests--not even one that I love so well as my cousin
Frank. The Portray mountains are somewhat extensive, and at the back of
them there is a little shooting-lodge."

"Oh, indeed," said Lord Fawn, feeling that he had better dash at once at
the diamonds.

"If you, my lord, could manage to join us for a day, my cousin and his
friend would, I am sure, come over to the castle, so that you should not
suffer from being left alone with me and Miss Macnulty."

"At present it is impossible," said Lord Fawn; and then he paused. "Lady
Eustace, the position in which you and I stand to each other is one not
altogether free from trouble."

"You cannot say that it is of my making," she said with a smile. "You once
asked--what men think a favour from me--and I granted it, perhaps too
easily."

"I know how greatly I am indebted to your goodness, Lady Eustace----" And
then again he paused.

"Lord Fawn!"

"I trust you will believe that nothing can be further from me than that
you should be harassed by any conduct of mine."

"I am harassed, my lord."

"And so am I. I have learned that you are in possession of certain jewels
which I cannot allow to be held by my wife."

"I am not your wife, Lord Fawn." As she said this she rose from her
reclining posture and sat erect.

"That is true. You are not. But you said you would be."

"Go on, sir."

"It was the pride of my life to think that I had attained to so much
happiness. Then came this matter of the diamonds."

"What business have you with my diamonds more than any other man?"

"Simply that I am told that they are not yours."

"Who tells you so?"

"Various people. Mr. Camperdown."

"If you, my lord, intend to take an attorney's word against mine, and that
on a matter as to which no one but myself can know the truth, then you are
not fit to be my husband. The diamonds are my own, and should you and I
become man and wife, they must remain so by special settlement. While I
choose to keep them they will be mine, to do with them as I please. It
will be my pleasure, when my boy marries, to hang them round his bride's
neck." She carried herself well, and spoke her words with dignity.

"What I have got to say is this," began Lord Fawn. "I must consider our
engagement as at an end unless you will give them up to Mr. Camperdown."

"I will not give them up to Mr. Camperdown."

"Then--then--then----"

"And I make bold to tell you, Lord Fawn, that you are not behaving to me
like a man of honour. I shall now leave the matter in the hands of my
cousin, Mr. Greystock." Then she sailed out of the room, and Lord Fawn was
driven to escape from the house as he might. He stood about the room for
five minutes with his hat in his hand, and then walked down and let
himself out of the front door.




CHAPTER XX

THE DIAMONDS BECOME TROUBLESOME


The 30th of July came round, and Lizzie was prepared for her journey down
to Scotland. She was to be accompanied by Miss Macnulty and her own maid
and her own servants, and to travel of course like a grand lady. She had
not seen Lord Fawn since the meeting recorded in the last chapter, but had
seen her cousin Frank nearly every other day. He, after much
consideration, had written a long letter to Lord Fawn, in which he had
given that nobleman to understand that some explanation was required as to
conduct which Frank described as being to him "at present unintelligible."
He then went at considerable length into the matter of the diamonds, with
the object of proving that Lord Fawn could have no possible right to
interfere in the matter. And though he had from the first wished that
Lizzie would give up the trinket, he made various points in her favour.
Not only had they been given to his cousin by her late husband; but even
had they not been so given, they would have been hers by will. Sir Florian
had left her everything that was within the walls of Portray Castle, and
the diamonds had been at Portray at the time of Sir Florian's death. Such
was Frank's statement--untrue indeed, but believed by him to be true. This
was one of Lizzie's lies, forged as soon as she understood that some
subsidiary claim might be made upon them on the ground that they formed a
portion of property left by will away from her; some claim subsidiary to
the grand claim, that the necklace was a family heirloom. Lord Fawn was
not in the least shaken in his conviction that Lizzie had behaved, and was
behaving, badly, and that, therefore, he had better get rid of her; but he
knew that he must be very wary in the reasons he would give for jilting
her. He wrote, therefore, a very short note to Greystock, promising that
any explanation needed should be given as soon as circumstances should
admit of his forming a decision. In the mean time the 30th of July came,
and Lady Eustace was ready for her journey.

There is, or there was, a train leaving London for Carlisle at eleven A.
M., by which Lizzie purposed to travel, so that she might sleep in that
city and go on through Dumfries to Portray the next morning. This was her
scheme; but there was another part of her scheme as to which she had felt
much doubt. Should she leave the diamonds, or should she take them with
her? The iron box in which they were kept was small, and so far portable
that a strong man might carry it without much trouble. Indeed, Lizzie
could move it from one part of the room to the other, and she had often
done so. But it was so heavy that it could not be taken with her without
attracting attention. The servant would know what it was, and the porter
would know, and Miss Macnulty would know. That her own maid should know
was a matter of course; but even to her own maid the journey of the jewels
would be remarkable because of the weight of the box, whereas if they went
with her other jewels in her dressing-case, there would be nothing
remarkable. She might even have taken them in her pocket, had she dared.
But she did not dare. Though she was intelligent and courageous, she was
wonderfully ignorant as to what might and what might not be done for the
recovery of the necklace by Mr. Camperdown. She did not dare to take them
without the iron box, and at last she decided that the box should go. At a
little after ten, her own carriage--the job-carriage, which was now about
to perform its last journey in her service--was at the door, and a cab was
there for the servants. The luggage was brought down, and with the larger
boxes was brought the iron case with the necklace. The servant, certainly
making more of the weight than he need have done, deposited it as a
footstool for Lizzie, who then seated herself, and was followed by Miss
Macnulty. She would have it placed in the same way beneath her feet in the
railway carriage, and again brought into her room at the Carlisle Hotel.
What though the porter did know! There was nothing illegal in travelling
about with a heavy iron box full of diamonds, and the risk would be less
this way, she thought, than were she to leave them behind her in London.
The house in Mount Street, which she had taken for the season, was to be
given up; and whom could she trust in London? Her very bankers, she
feared, would have betrayed her, and given up her treasure to Mr.
Camperdown. As for Messrs. Harter & Benjamin, she felt sure that they
would be bribed by Mr. Camperdown. She once thought of asking her cousin
to take the charge of them, but she could not bring herself to let them
out of her own hands. Ten thousand pounds! If she could only sell them and
get the money, from what a world of trouble would she be relieved. And the
sale, for another reason, would have been convenient; for Lady Eustace was
already a little in debt. But she could not sell them, and therefore when
she got into the carriage there was the box under her feet.

At that very moment who should appear on the pavement, standing between
the carriage and the house-door, but Mr. Camperdown? And with Mr.
Camperdown there was another man--a very suspicious-looking man, whom
Lizzie at once took to be a detective officer of police. "Lady Eustace!"
said Mr. Camperdown, taking off his hat. Lizzie bowed across Miss
Macnulty, and endeavoured to restrain the telltale blood from flying to
her cheeks. "I believe," said Mr. Camperdown, "that you are now starting
for Scotland."

"We are, Mr. Camperdown; and we are very late."

"Could you allow me two minutes' conversation with you in the house?"

"Oh dear, no. We are late, I tell you. What a time you have chosen for
coming, Mr. Camperdown!"

"It is an awkward hour, Lady Eustace. I only heard this morning that you
were going so soon, and it is imperative that I should see you."

"Had you not better write, Mr. Camperdown?"

"You will never answer my letters, Madam."

"I--I--I really cannot see you now. William, the coachman must drive on.
We cannot allow ourselves to lose the train. I am really very sorry, Mr.
Camperdown, but we must not lose the train."

"Lady Eustace," said Mr. Camperdown, putting his hand on the carriage-
door, and so demeaning himself that the coachman did not dare to drive on,
"I must ask you a question." He spoke in a low voice, but he was speaking
across Miss Macnulty. That lady, therefore, heard him, and so did William,
the servant, who was standing close to the door. "I must insist on knowing
where are the Eustace diamonds." Lizzie felt the box beneath her feet,
and, without showing that she did so, somewhat widened her drapery.

"I can tell you nothing now. William, make the coachman drive on."

"If you will not answer me, I must tell you that I shall be driven in the
execution of my duty to obtain a search-warrant, in order that they may be
placed in proper custody. They are not your property, and must be taken
out of your hands."

Lizzie looked at the suspicious man with a frightened gaze. The suspicious
man was, in fact, a very respectable clerk in Mr. Camperdown's employment,
but Lizzie for a moment felt that the search was about to begin at once.
She had hardly understood the threat, and thought that the attorney was
already armed with the powers of which he spoke. She glanced for a moment
at Miss Macnulty, and then at the servant. Would they betray her? If they
chose to use force to her, the box certainly might be taken from her. "I
know I shall lose the train," she said. "I know I shall. I must insist
that you let my servant drive on." There was now a little crowd of a dozen
persons on the pavement, and there was nothing to cover her diamonds but
the skirt of her travelling-dress.

"Are they in this house, Lady Eustace?"

"Why doesn't he go on?" shouted Lizzie. "You have no right, sir, to stop
me. I won't be stopped."

"Or have you got them with you?"

"I shall answer no questions. You have no right to treat me in this way."

"Then I shall be forced, on behalf of the family, to obtain a search-
warrant, both here and in Ayrshire, and proceedings will be taken also
against your ladyship personally."

So saying, Mr. Camperdown withdrew, and at last the carriage was driven
on.

As it happened, there was time enough for catching the train, and to
spare. The whole affair in Mount Street had taken less than ten minutes.
But the effect upon Lizzie was very severe. For a while she could not
speak, and at last she burst out into hysteric tears--not a sham fit, but
a true convulsive agony of sobbing. All the world of Mount Street,
including her own servants, had heard the accusation against her. During
the whole morning she had been wishing that she had never seen the
diamonds; but now it was almost impossible that she should part with them.
And yet they were like a load upon her chest, a load as heavy as though
she was compelled to sit with the iron box on her lap day and night. In
her sobbing she felt the thing under her feet and knew that she could not
get rid of it. She hated the box, and yet she must cling to it now. She
was thoroughly ashamed of the box, and yet she must seem to take a pride
in it. She was horribly afraid of the box, and yet she must keep it in her
own very bedroom. And what should she say about the box now to Miss
Macnulty, who sat by her side, stiff and scornful, offering her smelling-
bottles, but not offering her sympathy? "My dear," she said at last, "that
horrid man has quite upset me."

"I don't wonder that you should be upset," said Miss Macnulty.

"And so unjust, too--so false--so--so--so---They are my own as much as
that umbrella is yours, Miss Macnulty."

"I don't know," said Miss Macnulty.

"But I tell you," said Lizzie.

"What I mean is, that it is such a pity there should be a doubt."

"There is no doubt," said Lizzie; "how dare you say there is a doubt? My
cousin, Mr. Greystock, says that there is not the slightest doubt. He is a
barrister, and must know better than an attorney like that Mr.
Camperdown." By this time they were at the Euston Square station, and then
there was more trouble with the box. The footman struggled with it into
the waiting-room, and the porter struggled with it from the waiting-room
to the carriage. Lizzie could not but look at the porter as he carried it,
and she felt sure that the man had been told of its contents and was
struggling with the express view of adding to her annoyance. The same
thing happened at Carlisle, where the box was carried up into Lizzie's
bedroom by the footman, and where she was convinced that her treasure had
become the subject of conversation for the whole house. In the morning
people looked at her as she walked down the long platform with the box
still struggling before her. She almost wished that she had undertaken its
carriage herself, as she thought that even she could have managed with
less outward show of effort. Her own servants seemed to be in league
against her, and Miss Macnulty had never before been so generally
unpleasant. Poor Miss Macnulty, who had a conscientious idea of doing her
duty, and who always attempted to give an adequate return for the bread
she ate, could not so far overcome the effect of Mr. Camperdown's visit as
to speak on any subject without being stiff and hard. And she suffered,
too, from the box, to such a degree that she turned over in her mind the
thought of leaving Lizzie if any other possible home might be found for
her. Who would willingly live with a woman who always travelled about with
a diamond necklace worth ten thousand pounds, locked up in an iron safe--
and that necklace not her own property?

But at last Lady Eustace, and Miss Macnulty, and the servants--and the
iron box--reached Portray Castle in safety.




CHAPTER XXI

"IANTHE'S SOUL"


Lady Eustace had been rather cross on the journey down to Scotland, and
had almost driven the unfortunate Macnulty to think that Lady Linlithgow
or the workhouse would be better than this young tyrant; but on her
arrival at her own house she was for a while all smiles and kindness.
During the journey she had been angry without thought, but was almost
entitled to be excused for her anger. Could Miss Macnulty have realised
the amount of oppression inflicted on her patroness by the box of
diamonds, she would have forgiven anything. Hitherto there had been some
secrecy, or at any rate some privacy, attached to the matter; but now that
odious lawyer had discussed the matter aloud, in the very streets, in the
presence of servants, and Lady Eustace had felt that it was discussed also
by every porter on the railway from London down to Troon, the station in
Scotland at which her own carriage met her to take her to her own castle.
The night at Carlisle had been terrible to her, and the diamonds had never
been for a moment off her mind. Perhaps the worst of it all was that her
own man-servant and maid-servant had heard the claim which had been so
violently made by Mr. Camperdown. There are people in that respect very
fortunately circumstanced, whose servants, as a matter of course, know all
their affairs, have an interest in their concerns, sympathise with their
demands, feel their wants, and are absolutely at one with them. But in
such cases the servants are really known, and are almost as completely a
part of the family as the sons and daughters. There may be disruptions and
quarrels; causes may arise for ending the existing condition of things;
but while this condition lasts the servants in such households are for the
most part only too well inclined to fight the battles of their employers.
Mr. Binns, the butler, would almost foam at the mouth if it were suggested
to him that the plate at Silvercup Hall was not the undoubted property of
the old squire; and Mrs. Pouncebox could not be made to believe, by any
amount of human evidence, that the jewels which her lady has worn for the
last fifteen years are not her ladyship's very own. Binns would fight for
the plate, and so would Pouncebox for the jewels, almost till they were
cut to pieces. The preservation of these treasures on behalf of those who
paid them their wages and fed them, who occasionally scolded them, but
always succoured them, would be their point of honour. No torture would
get the key of the cellar from Binns; no threats extract from Pouncebox a
secret of the toilet. But poor Lizzie Eustace had no Binns and no
Pouncebox. They are plants that grow slowly. There was still too much of
the mushroom about Lady Eustace to permit of her possessing such
treasures. Her footman was six feet high, was not bad-looking, and was
called Thomas. She knew no more about him, and was far too wise to expect
sympathy from him, or other aid than the work for which she paid him. Her
own maid was somewhat nearer to her; but not much nearer. The girl's name
was Patience Crabstick, and she could do hair well. Lizzie knew but little
more of her than that.

Lizzie considered herself to be still engaged to be married to Lord Fawn,
but there was no sympathy to be had in that quarter. Frank Greystock might
be induced to sympathise with her, but hardly after the fashion which
Lizzie desired. And then sympathy in that direction would be so dangerous
should she decide upon going on with the Fawn marriage. For the present
she had quarrelled with Lord Fawn; but the very bitterness of that
quarrel, and the decision with which her betrothed had declared his
intention of breaking off the match, made her the more resolute that she
would marry him. During her journey to Portray she had again determined
that he should be her husband; and, if so, advanced sympathy--sympathy
that would be pleasantly tender with her cousin Frank--would be dangerous.
She would be quite willing to accept even Miss Macnulty's sympathy if that
humble lady would give it to her of the kind she wanted. She declared to
herself that she could pour herself out on Miss Macnulty's bosom, and
mingle her tears even with Miss Macnulty's if only Miss Macnulty would
believe in her. If Miss Macnulty would be enthusiastic about the jewels,
enthusiastic as to the wickedness of Lord Fawn, enthusiastic in praising
Lizzie herself, Lizzie--so she told herself--would have showered all the
sweets of female friendship even on Miss Macnulty's head. But Miss
Macnulty was as hard as a deal board. She did as she was bidden, thereby
earning her bread. But there was no tenderness in her; no delicacy; no
feeling; no comprehension. It was thus that Lady Eustace judged her humble
companion; and in one respect she judged her rightly. Miss Macnulty did
not believe in Lady Eustace, and was not sufficiently gifted to act up to
a belief which she did not entertain.

Poor Lizzie! The world, in judging of people who are false, and bad, and
selfish, and prosperous to outward appearances, is apt to be hard upon
them, and to forget the punishments which generally accompany such faults.
Lizzie Eustace was very false, and bad, and selfish, and, we may say, very
prosperous also; but in the midst of all she was thoroughly uncomfortable.
She was never at ease. There was no green spot in her life with which she
could be contented. And though, after a fashion, she knew herself to be
false and bad, she was thoroughly convinced that she was ill-used by
everybody about her. She was being very badly treated by Lord Fawn; but
she flattered herself that she would be able to make Lord Fawn know more
of her character before she had done with him.

Portray Castle was really a castle, not simply a country mansion so
called, but a stone edifice with battlements and a round tower at one
corner, and a gate which looked as if it might have had a portcullis, and
narrow windows in a portion of it, and a cannon mounted upon a low roof,
and an excavation called the moat, but which was now a fantastic and
somewhat picturesque garden, running round two sides of it. In very truth,
though a portion of the castle was undoubtedly old and had been built when
strength was needed for defence and probably for the custody of booty, the
battlements, and the round tower, and the awe-inspiring gateway had all
been added by one of the late Sir Florians. But the castle looked like a
castle, and was interesting. As a house it was not particularly eligible,
the castle form of domestic architecture being exigent in its nature, and
demanding that space, which in less ambitious houses can be applied to
comfort, shall be surrendered to magnificence. There was a great hall, and
a fine dining-room, with plate-glass windows looking out upon the sea; but
the other sitting-rooms were insignificant, and the bedrooms were here and
there, and were for the most part small and dark. That, however, which
Lizzie had appropriated to her own use was a grand chamber, looking also
out upon the open sea.

The castle stood upon a bluff of land, with a fine prospect of the Firth
of Clyde, and with a distant view of the Isle of Arran. When the air was
clear, as it often is clear there, the Arran hills could be seen from
Lizzie's window, and she was proud of talking of the prospect. In other
respects, perhaps, the castle was somewhat desolate. There were a few
stunted trees around it, but timber had not prospered there. There was a
grand kitchen garden, or rather a kitchen garden which had been intended
to be grand; but since Lizzie's reign had been commenced, the grandeur had
been neglected. Grand kitchen gardens are expensive, and Lizzie had at
once been firm in reducing the under-gardeners from five men to one and a
boy. The head gardener had of course left her at once; but that had not
broken her heart, and she had hired a modest man at a guinea a week
instead of a scientific artist, who was by no means modest, with a hundred
and twenty pounds a year, and coals, house, milk, and all other
horticultural luxuries. Though Lizzie was prosperous and had a fine
income, she was already aware that she could not keep up a town and
country establishment and be a rich woman on four thousand a year. There
was a flower garden and small shrubbery within the so-called moat; but,
otherwise, the grounds of Portray Castle were not alluring. The place was
sombre, exposed, and in winter very cold; and except that the expanse of
sea beneath the hill on which stood the castle was fine and open, it had
no great claim to praise on the score of scenery. Behind the castle, and
away from the sea, the low mountains belonging to the estate stretched for
some eight or ten miles; and toward the further end of them, where stood a
shooting-lodge, called always The Cottage, the landscape became rough and
grand. It was in this cottage that Frank Greystock was to be sheltered
with his friend, when he came down to shoot what Lady Eustace had called
her three annual grouse.

She ought to have been happy and comfortable. There will, of course, be
some to say that a young widow should not be happy and comfortable--that
she should be weeping her lost lord, and subject to the desolation of
bereavement. But as the world goes now, young widows are not miserable;
and there is, perhaps, a growing tendency in society to claim from them
year by year still less of any misery that may be avoidable. Suttee
propensities of all sorts, from burning alive down to bombazine and
hideous forms of clothing, are becoming less and less popular among the
nations, and women are beginning to learn that, let what misfortunes will
come upon them, it is well for them to be as happy as their nature will
allow them to be. A woman may thoroughly respect her husband, and mourn
him truly, honestly, with her whole heart, and yet enjoy thoroughly the
good things which he has left behind for her use. It was not, at any rate,
sorrow for the lost Sir Florian that made Lady Eustace uncomfortable. She
had her child. She had her income. She had her youth and beauty. She had
Portray Castle. She had a new lover, and, if she chose to be quit of him,
not liking him well enough for the purpose, she might undoubtedly have
another whom she would like better. She had hitherto been thoroughly
successful in her life. And yet she was unhappy. What was it that she
wanted?

She had been a very clever child--a clever, crafty child; and now she was
becoming a clever woman. Her craft remained with her; but so keen was her
outlook upon the world, that she was beginning to perceive that craft, let
it be never so crafty, will in the long run miss its own object. She
actually envied the simplicity of Lucy Morris, for whom she delighted to
find evil names, calling her demure, a prig, a sly puss, and so on. But
she could see--or half see--that Lucy with her simplicity was stronger
than was she with her craft. She had nearly captivated Frank Greystock
with her wiles, but without any wiles Lucy had captivated him altogether.
And a man captivated by wiles was only captivated for a time, whereas a
man won by simplicity would be won for ever--if he himself were worth the
winning. And this too she felt--that let her success be what it might, she
could not be happy unless she could win a man's heart. She had won Sir
Florian's, but that had been but for an hour--for a month or two. And then
Sir Florian had never really won hers. Could not she be simple? Could not
she act simplicity so well that the thing acted should be as powerful as
the thing itself; perhaps even more powerful? Poor Lizzie Eustace! In
thinking over all this she saw a great deal. It was wonderful that she
should see so much and tell herself so many home truths. But there was one
truth she could not see, and therefore could not tell it to herself. She
had not a heart to give. It had become petrified during those lessons of
early craft in which she had taught herself how to get the better of
Messrs. Harter & Benjamin, of Sir Florian Eustace, of Lady Linlithgow, and
of Mr. Camperdown.

Her ladyship had now come down to her country house, leaving London and
all its charms before the end of the season, actuated by various motives.
In the first place, the house in Mount Street was taken furnished, by the
month, and the servants were hired after the same fashion, and the horses
jobbed. Lady Eustace was already sufficiently intimate with her accounts
to know that she would save two hundred pounds by not remaining another
month or three weeks in London, and sufficiently observant of her own
affairs to have perceived that such saving was needed. And then it
appeared to her that her battle with Lord Fawn could be better fought from
a distance than at close quarters. London, too, was becoming absolutely
distasteful to her. There were many things there that tended to make her
unhappy, and so few that she could enjoy. She was afraid of Mr.
Camperdown, and ever on the rack lest some dreadful thing should come upon
her in respect of the necklace, some horrible paper served upon her from a
magistrate, ordering her appearance at Newgate, or perhaps before the Lord
Chancellor, or a visit from policemen who would be empowered to search for
and carry off the iron box. And then there was so little in her London
life to gratify her! It is pleasant to win in a fight; but to be always
fighting is not pleasant. Except in those moments, few and far between, in
which she was alone with her cousin Frank--and perhaps in those other
moments in which she wore her diamonds--she had but little in London that
she enjoyed. She still thought that a time would come when it would be
otherwise. Under these influences she had actually made herself believe
that she was sighing for the country, and for solitude; for the wide
expanse of her own bright waves--as she had called them--and for the rocks
of dear Portray. She had told Miss Macnulty and Augusta Fawn that she
thirsted for the breezes of Ayrshire, so that she might return to her
books and her thoughts. Amid the whirl of London it was impossible either
to read or to think. And she believed it too herself. She so believed it
that on the first morning of her arrival she took a little volume in her
pocket, containing Shelley's "Queen Mab," and essayed to go down upon the
rocks. She had actually breakfasted at nine, and was out on the sloping
grounds below the castle before ten, having made some boast to Miss
Macnulty about the morning air.

She scrambled down, not very far down, but a little way beneath the garden
gate, to a spot on which a knob of rock cropped out from the scanty
herbage of the incipient cliff. Fifty yards lower the real rocks began;
and, though the real rocks were not very rocky, not precipitous or even
bold, and were partially covered with salt-fed mosses down almost to the
sea, nevertheless they justified her in talking about her rock-bound
shore. The shore was hers, for her life, and it was rock-bound, This knob
she had espied from her windows; and, indeed, had been thinking of it for
the last week, as a place appropriate to solitude and Shelley. She had
stood on it before, and had stretched her arms with enthusiasm toward the
just-visible mountains of Arran. On that occasion the weather, perhaps,
had been cool; but now a blazing sun was overhead, and when she had been
seated half a minute, and "Queen Mab" had been withdrawn from her pocket,
she found that it would not do. It would not do even with the canopy she
could make for herself with her parasol. So she stood up and looked about
herself for shade; for shade in some spot in which she could still look
out upon "her dear wide ocean with its glittering smile." For it was thus
that she would talk about the mouth of the Clyde. Shelter near her there
was none. The scrubby trees lay nearly half a mile to the right, and up
the hill too. She had once clambered down to the actual shore, and might
do so again. But she doubted that there would be shelter even there; and
the clambering up on that former occasion had been a nuisance, and would
be a worse nuisance now. Thinking of all this, and feeling the sun keenly,
she gradually retraced her steps to the garden within the moat, and seated
herself, Shelley in hand, within the summer-house. The bench was narrow,
hard, and broken; and there were some snails which discomposed her; but,
nevertheless, she would make the best of it. Her darling "Queen Mab" must
be read without the coarse, inappropriate, every-day surroundings of a
drawing-room; and it was now manifest to her that unless she could get up
much earlier in the morning, or come out to her reading after sunset, the
knob of rock would not avail her.

She began her reading, resolved that she would enjoy her poetry in spite
of the narrow seat. She had often talked of "Queen Mab," and perhaps she
thought she had read it. This, however, was in truth her first attempt at
that work. "How wonderful is Death, Death and his brother Sleep." Then she
half-closed the volume, and thought that she enjoyed the idea. Death-and
his brother Sleep! She did not know why they should be more wonderful than
Action, or Life, or Thought; but the words were of a nature which would
enable her to remember them, and they would be good for quoting. "Sudden
arose Ianthe's soul; it stood All beautiful in naked purity." The name of
Ianthe suited her exactly. And the antithesis conveyed to her mind by
naked purity struck her strongly, and she determined to learn the passage
by heart. Eight or nine lines were printed separately, like a stanza, and
the labour would not be great, and the task, when done, would be complete.
"Instinct with inexpressible beauty and grace, Each stain of earthliness
Had passed away, it reassumed Its native dignity, and stood Immortal amid
ruin." Which was instinct with beauty, the stain or the soul, she did not
stop to inquire, and may be excused for not understanding. "Ah," she
exclaimed to herself, "how true it is; how one feels it; how it comes home
to one!--Sudden arose Ianthe's soul.'" And then she walked about the
garden, repeating the words to herself, and almost forgetting the heat.
"'Each stain of earthliness had passed away.' Ha; yes. They will pass away
and become instinct with beauty and grace." A dim idea came upon her that
when this happy time should arrive, no one would claim her necklace from
her, and that the man at the stables would not be so disagreeably punctual
in sending in his bill. "'All beautiful in naked purity!'" What a tawdry
world was this in which clothes and food and houses are necessary! How
perfectly that boy poet had understood it all. "'Immortal amid ruin'!" She
liked the idea of the ruin almost as well as that of the immortality, and
the stains quite as well as the purity. As immortality must come, and as
stains were instinct with grace, why be afraid of ruin? But then, if
people go wrong--at least women--they are not asked out anywhere! "'Sudden
arose Ianthe's soul; it stood all beautiful----.'" And so the piece was
learned, and Lizzie felt that she had devoted her hour to poetry in a
quite rapturous manner. At any rate she had a bit to quote; and though in
truth she did not understand the exact bearing of the image, she had so
studied her gestures and so modulated her voice, that she knew that she
could be effective. She did not then care to carry her reading further,
but returned with the volume into the house. Though the passage about
Ianthe's soul comes very early in the work, she was now quite familiar
with the poem, and when in after days she spoke of it as a thing of beauty
that she had made her own by long study, she actually did not know that
she was lying. As she grew older, however, she quickly became wiser, and
was aware that in learning one passage of a poem it is expedient to select
one in the middle or at the end. The world is so cruelly observant
nowadays that even men and women who have not themselves read their "Queen
Mab" will know from what part of the poem a morsel is extracted, and will
not give you credit for a page beyond that from which your passage comes.

After lunch Lizzie invited Miss Macnulty to sit at the open window of the
drawing-room and look out upon the "glittering waves." In giving Miss
Macnulty her due we must acknowledge that, though she owned no actual
cleverness herself, had no cultivated tastes, read but little, and that
little of a colourless kind, and thought nothing of her hours but that she
might get rid of them and live, yet she had a certain power of insight,
and could see a thing. Lizzie Eustace was utterly powerless to impose upon
her. Such as Lizzie was, Miss Macnulty was willing to put up with her and
accept her bread. The people whom she had known had been either worthless
--as had been her own father, or cruel--like Lady Linlithgow, or false--as
was Lady Eustace. Miss Macnulty knew that worthlessness, cruelty, and
falseness had to be endured by such as she. And she could bear them
without caring much about them; not condemning them, even within her own
heart, very heavily. But she was strangely deficient in this, that she
could not call these qualities by other names, even to the owners of them.
She was unable to pretend to believe Lizzie's rhapsodies. It was hardly
conscience or a grand spirit of truth that actuated her, as much as a want
of the courage needed for lying. She had not had the face to call old Lady
Linlithgow kind, and therefore old Lady Linlithgow had turned her out of
the house. When Lady Eustace called on her for sympathy, she had not
courage enough to dare to attempt the bit of acting which would be
necessary for sympathetic expression. She was like a dog or a child, and
was unable not to be true. Lizzie was longing for a little mock sympathy--
was longing to show off her Shelley, and was very kind to Miss Macnulty
when she got the poor lady into the recess of the window. "This is nice;
is it not?" she said, as she spread her hand out through the open space
toward the "wide expanse of glittering waves."

"Very nice, only it glares so," said Miss Macnulty.

"Ah, I love the full warmth of the real summer. With me it always seems
that the sun is needed to bring to true ripeness the fruit of the heart."
Nevertheless she had been much troubled both by the heat and by the midges
when she tried to sit on the stone. "I always think of those few glorious
days which I passed with my darling Florian at Naples; days too glorious
because they were so few." Now Miss Macnulty knew some of the history of
those days and of their glory, and knew also how the widow had borne her
loss.

"I suppose the bay of Naples is fine," she said.

"It is not only the bay. There are scenes there which ravish you, only it
is necessary that there should be some one with you that can understand
you. 'Soul of Ianthe!'" she said, meaning to apostrophise that of the
deceased Sir Florian. "You have read 'Queen Mab'?"

"I don't know that I ever did. If I have, I have forgotten it."

"Ah, you should read it. I know nothing in the English language that
brings home to one so often one's own best feelings and aspirations. 'It
stands all beautiful in naked purity,'" she continued, still alluding to
poor Sir Florian's soul. "'Instinct with inexpressible beauty and grace,
each stain of earthliness had passed away.' I can see him now in all his
manly beauty, as we used to sit together by the hour, looking over the
waters. Oh, Julia, the thing itself has gone, the earthly reality; but the
memory of it will live forever."

"He was a very handsome man certainly," said Miss Macnulty, finding
herself forced to say something.

"I see him now," she went on, still gazing out upon the shining water.
"'It reassumed its native dignity and stood primeval amid ruin.' Is not
that a glorious idea, gloriously worded?" She had forgotten one word and
used a wrong epithet; but it sounded just as well. Primeval seemed to her
to be a very poetical word.

"To tell the truth," said Miss Macnulty, "I never understand poetry when
it is quoted unless I happen to know the passage beforehand. I think I'll
go away from this, for the light is too much for my poor old eyes."
Certainly Miss Macnulty had fallen into a profession for which she was not
suited.




CHAPTER XXII

LADY EUSTACE PROCURES A PONY FOR THE USE OF HER COUSIN


Lady Eustace could make nothing of Miss Macnulty in the way of sympathy,
and could not bear her disappointment with patience. It was hardly to be
expected that she should do so. She paid a great deal for Miss Macnulty.
In a moment of rash generosity, and at a time when she hardly knew what
money meant, she had promised Miss Macnulty seventy pounds for the first
year and seventy for the second, should the arrangement last longer than a
twelvemonth. The second year had been now commenced, and Lady Eustace was
beginning to think that seventy pounds was a great deal of money when so
very little was given in return. Lady Linlithgow had paid her dependent no
fixed salary. And then there was the lady's "keep" and first-class
travelling when they went up and down to Scotland, and cab-fares in London
when it was desirable that Miss Macnulty should absent herself. Lizzie,
reckoning all up, and thinking that for so much her friend ought to be
ready to discuss Ianthe's soul, or any other kindred subject, at a
moment's warning, would become angry and would tell herself that she was
being swindled out of her money. She knew how necessary it was that she
should have some companion at the present emergency of her life, and
therefore could not at once send Miss Macnulty away; but she would
sometimes become very cross and would tell poor Macnulty that she was--a
fool. Upon the whole, however, to be called a fool was less objectionable
to Miss Macnulty than were demands for sympathy which she did not know how
to give.

Those first ten days of August went very slowly with Lady Eustace. "Queen
Mab" got itself poked away, and was heard of no more. But there were other
books. A huge box full of novels had come down, and Miss Macnulty was a
great devourer of novels. If Lady Eustace would talk to her about the
sorrows of the poorest heroine that ever saw her lover murdered before her
eyes, and then come to life again with ten thousand pounds a year, for a
period of three weeks--or till another heroine, who had herself been
murdered, obliterated the former horrors from her plastic mind--Miss
Macnulty could discuss the catastrophe with the keenest interest. And
Lizzie, finding herself to be, as she told herself, unstrung, fell also
into novel-reading. She had intended during this vacant time to master the
"Faery Queen"; but the "Faery Queen" fared even worse than "Queen Mab";
and the studies of Portray Castle were confined to novels. For poor
Macnulty, if she could only be left alone, this was well enough. To have
her meals, and her daily walk, and her fill of novels, and to be left
alone, was all that she asked of the gods. But it was not so with Lady
Eustace, She asked much more than that, and was now thoroughly
discontented with her own idleness. She was sure that she could have read
Spenser from sunrise to sundown, with no other break than an hour or two
given to Shelley, if only there had been some one to sympathise with her
in her readings. But there was no one, and she was very cross. Then there
came a letter to her from her cousin, which for that morning brought some
life back to the castle. "I have seen Lord Fawn," said the letter, "and I
have also seen Mr. Camperdown. As it would be very hard to explain what
took place at these interviews by letter, and as I shall be at Portray
Castle on the 20th, I will not make the attempt. We shall go down by the
night train, and I will get over to you as soon as I have dressed and had
my breakfast. I suppose I can find some kind of a pony for the journey.
The 'we' consists of myself and my friend Mr. Herriot, a man whom I think
you will like, if you will condescend to see him, though he is a barrister
like myself. You need express no immediate condescension in his favour, as
I shall of course come over alone on Wednesday morning. Yours always
affectionately, F. G."

The letter she received on the Sunday morning, and as the Wednesday named
for Frank's coming was the next Wednesday, and was close at hand, she was
in rather a better humour than she had displayed since the poets had
failed her. "What a blessing it will be," she said, "to have somebody to
speak to."

This was not complimentary, but Miss Macnulty did not want compliments.
"Yes, indeed," she said. "Of course you will be glad to see your cousin."

"I shall be glad to see anything in the shape of a man. I declare I have
felt almost inclined to ask the minister from Craigie to elope with me."

"He has got seven children," said Miss Macnulty.

"Yes, poor man, and a wife, and not more than enough to live upon. I
daresay he would have come. By the by, I wonder whether there's a pony
about the place."

"A pony!" Miss Macnulty of course supposed that it was needed for the
purpose of the suggested elopement.

"Yes; I suppose you know what a pony is? Of course there ought to be a
shooting pony at the cottage for these men. My poor head has so many
things to work upon that I had forgotten it; and you're never any good at
thinking of things."

"I didn't know that gentlemen wanted ponies for shooting."

"I wonder what you do know? Of course there must be a pony."

"I suppose you'll want two?"

"No, I sha'n't. You don't suppose that men always go riding about. But I
want one. What had I better do?" Miss Macnulty suggested that Gowran
should be consulted. Now Gowran was the steward, and bailiff, and manager,
and factotum about the place, who bought a cow or sold one if occasion
required, and saw that nobody stole anything, and who knew the boundaries
of the farms, and all about the tenants, and looked after the pipes when
frost came, and was an honest, domineering, hard-working, intelligent
Scotchman, who had been brought up to love the Eustaces, and who hated his
present mistress with all his heart. He did not leave her service, having
an idea in his mind that it was now the great duty of his life to save
Portray from her ravages. Lizzie fully returned the compliment of the
hatred, and was determined to rid herself of Andy Gowran's services as
soon as possible. He had been called Andy by the late Sir Florian, and,
though every one else about the place called him Mr. Gowran, Lady Eustace
thought it became her, as the man's mistress, to treat him as he had been
treated by the late master. So she called him Andy. But she was resolved
to get rid of him, as soon as she should dare. There were things which it
was essential that somebody about the place should know, and no one knew
them but Mr. Gowran. Every servant in the castle might rob her, were it
not for the protection afforded by Mr. Gowran. In that affair of the
garden it was Mr. Gowran who had enabled her to conquer the horticultural
Leviathan who had oppressed her, and who, in point of wages, had been a
much bigger man than Mr. Gowran himself. She trusted Mr. Gowran and hated
him, whereas Mr. Gowran hated her, and did not trust her.

"I believe you think that nothing can be done at Portray except by that
man," said Lady Eustace.

"He'll know how much you ought to pay for the pony."

"Yes, and get some brute not fit for my cousin to ride, on purpose,
perhaps, to break his neck."

"Then I should ask Mr. Macallum, the postmaster of Troon, for I have seen
three or four very quiet-looking ponies standing in the carts at his
door."

"Macnulty, if there ever was an idiot you are one," said Lady Eustace,
throwing up her hands. "To think that I should get a pony for my cousin
Frank out of one of the mail carts."

"I daresay I am an idiot," said Miss Macnulty, resuming her novel.

Lady Eustace was, of course, obliged to have recourse to Gowran, to whom
she applied on the Monday morning. Not even Lizzie Eustace, on behalf of
her cousin Frank, would have dared to disturb Mr. Gowran with
considerations respecting a pony on the Sabbath. On the Monday morning she
found Mr. Gowran superintending four boys and three old women, who were
making a bit of her ladyship's hay on the ground above the castle. The
ground about the castle was poor and exposed, and her ladyship's hay was
apt to be late.

"Andy," she said, "I shall want to get a pony for the gentlemen who are
coming to the cottage. It must be there by Tuesday evening."

"A pownie, my leddie?"

"Yes; a pony. I suppose a pony may be purchased in Ayrshire, though of all
places in the world it seems to have the fewest of the comforts of life."

"Them as find it like that, my leddie, needn't bide there."

"Never mind. You will have the kindness to have a pony purchased and put
into the stables of the cottage on Tuesday afternoon. There are stables,
no doubt."

"Oh, ay, there's shelter, nae doot, for mair pownies than they's ride.
When the cottage was biggit, my leddie, there was nae cause for sparing
nowt." Andy Gowran was continually throwing her comparative poverty in
poor Lizzie's teeth, and there was nothing he could do which displeased
her more.

"And I needn't spare my cousin the use of a pony," she said
grandiloquently, but feeling as she did so that she was exposing herself
before the man. "You'll have the goodness to procure one for him on
Tuesday."

"But there ain't aits nor yet fother, nor nowt for bedding down. And wha's
to tent the pownie? There's mair in keeping a pownie than your leddyship
thinks. It'll be a matter of auchten and saxpence a week, will a pownie."
Mr. Gowran, as he expressed his prudential scruples, put a very strong
emphasis indeed on the sixpence.

"Very well. Let it be so."

"And there'll be the beastie to buy, my leddie. He'll be--a lump of money,
my leddie. Pownies ain't to be had for nowt in Ayrshire, as was ance, my
leddie."

"Of course, I must pay for him."

"He'll be a matter of--ten pound, my leddie."

"Very well."

"Or may be twal; just as likely." And Mr. Gowran shook his head at his
mistress in a most uncomfortable way. It was not strange that she should
hate him.

"You must give the proper price--of course."

"There ain't no proper prices for pownies--as there is for jew'ls and sich
like." If this was intended for sarcasm upon Lady Eustace in regard to her
diamonds, Mr. Gowran ought to have been dismissed on the spot. In such a
case no English jury would have given him his current wages. "And he'll be
to sell again, my leddie?"

"We shall see about that afterwards."

"Ye'll never let him eat his head off there a' the winter! He'll be to
sell. And the gentles'll ride him, may be, ance across the hillside, out
and back. As to the grouse, they can't cotch them with the pownie, for
there ain't none to cotch." There had been two keepers on the mountains--
men who were paid five or six shillings a week to look after the game in
addition to their other callings, and one of these had been sent away,
actually in obedience to Gowran's advice; so that this blow was cruel and
unmanly. He made it, too, as severe as he could by another shake of his
head.

"Do you mean to tell me that my cousin cannot be supplied with an animal
to ride upon?"

"My leddie, I've said nowt o' the kind. There ain't no useful animal as I
kens the name and nature of as he can't have in Ayrshire--for paying for
it, my leddie; horse, pownie, or ass, just whichever you please, my
leddie. But there'll be a seddle--"

"A what?"

There can be no doubt that Gowran purposely slurred the word so that his
mistress should not understand him. "Seddles don't come for nowt, my
leddie, though it be Ayrshire."

"I don't understand what it is that you say, Andy."

"A seddle, my leddie," said he, shouting the word at her at the top of his
voice--"and a briddle. I suppose as your leddy-ship's cousin don't ride
bareback up in Lunnon?"

"Of course there must be the necessary horse-furniture," said Lady
Eustace, retiring to the castle. Andy Gowran had certainly ill-used her,
and she swore that she would have revenge. Nor when, she was informed on
the Tuesday that an adequate pony had been hired for eighteen pence a day,
saddle, bridle, groom, and all included, was her heart at all softened
towards Mr. Gowran.




CHAPTER XXIII

FRANK GREYSTOCK'S FIRST VISIT TO PORTRAY


Had Frank Greystock known all that his cousin endured for his comfort,
would he have been grateful? Women, when they are fond of men, do think
much of men's comfort in small matters, and men are apt to take the good
things provided almost as a matter of course. When Frank Greystock and
Herriot reached the cottage about nine o'clock in the morning, having left
London over night by the limited mail train, the pony at once presented
itself to them. It was a little shaggy, black beast, with a boy almost as
shaggy as itself, but they were both good of their kind. "Oh, you're the
laddie with the pownie, are you?" said Frank, in answer to an announcement
made to him by the boy. He did at once perceive that Lizzie had taken
notice of the word in his note in which he had suggested that some means
of getting over to Portray would be needed, and he learned from the fact
that she was thinking of him and anxious to see him.

His friend was a man a couple of years younger than himself, who had
hitherto achieved no success at the bar, but who was nevertheless a
clever, diligent, well-instructed man. He was what the world calls
penniless, having an income from his father just sufficient to keep him
like a gentleman. He was not much known as a sportsman, his opportunities
for shooting not having been great; but he dearly loved the hills and
fresh air, and the few grouse which were--or were not--on Lady Eustace's
mountains would go as far with him as they would with any man. Before he
had consented to come with Frank, he had specially inquired whether there
was a game-keeper, and it was not till he had been assured that there was
no officer attached to the estate worthy of such a name, that he had
consented to come upon his present expedition. "I don't clearly know what
a gillie is," he said in answer to one of Frank's explanations. "If a
gillie means a lad without any breeches on, I don't mind; but I couldn't
stand a severe man got up in well-made velveteens, who would see through
my ignorance in a moment, and make known by comment the fact that he had
done so." Greystock had promised that there should be, no severity, and
Herriot had come. Greystock brought with him two guns, two fishing-rods, a
man-servant, and a huge hamper from Fortnum and Mason's. Arthur Herriot,
whom the attorneys had not yet loved, brought some very thick boots, a
pair of knickerbockers, together with Stone and Toddy's "Digest of the
Common Law." The best of the legal profession consists in this--that when
you get fairly at work you may give over working. An aspirant must learn
everything; but a man may make his fortune at it, and know almost nothing.
He may examine a witness with judgment, see through a case with precision,
address a jury with eloquence, and yet be altogether ignorant of law. But
he must be believed to be a very pundit before he will get a chance of
exercising his judgment, his precision, or his eloquence. The men whose
names are always in the newspapers never look at their Stone and Toddy--
care for it not at all--have their Stone and Toddy got up for them by
their juniors when cases require that reference shall be made to
precedents. But till that blessed time has come, a barrister who means
success should carry his Stone and Toddy with him everywhere. Greystock
never thought of the law now, unless he had some special case in hand; but
Herriot could not afford to go out on a holiday without two volumes of
Stone and Toddy's Digest in his portmanteau.

"You won't mind being left alone for the first morning?" said Frank, as
soon as they had finished the contents of one of the pots from Fortnum and
Mason.

"Not in the least. Stone and Toddy will carry me through."

"I'd go on the mountain if I were you, and get into a habit of steady
loading."

"Perhaps I will take a turn--just to find out how I feel in the
knickerbockers. At what time shall I dine if you don't come back?"

"I shall certainly be here to dinner," said Frank, "unless the pony fails
me or I get lost on the mountain." Then he started, and Herriot at once
went to work on Stone and Toddy, with a pipe in his mouth. He had
travelled all night, and it is hardly necessary to say that in five
minutes he was fast asleep.

So also had Frank travelled all night, but the pony and the fresh air kept
him awake. The boy had offered to go with him, but that he had altogether
refused; and, therefore, to his other cares was that of finding his way.
The sweep of the valleys, however, is long and not abrupt, and he could
hardly miss his road if he would only make one judicious turn through a
gap in a certain wall which lay half way between the cottage and the
castle. He was thinking of the work in hand, and he found the gap without
difficulty. When through that he ascended the hill for two miles, and then
the sea was before him, and Portray Castle, lying, as it seemed to him at
that distance, close upon the seashore. "Upon my word, Lizzie has not done
badly with herself," he said almost aloud, as he looked down upon the fair
sight beneath him, and round upon the mountains, and remembered that, for
her life at least, it was all hers, and after her death would belong to
her son. What more does any human being desire of such a property than
that?

He rode down to the great doorway--the mountain track, which fell on to
the road about half a mile from the castle, having been plain enough--and
there he gave up the pony into the hands of no less a man that Mr. Gowran
himself. Gowran had watched the pony coming down the mountain side, and
had desired to see of what like was "her leddyship's" cousin. In telling
the whole truth of Mr. Gowran it must be acknowledged that he thought that
his late master had made a very great mistake in the matter of his
marriage. He could not imagine bad things enough of Lady Eustace, and
almost believed that she was not now, and hadn't been before her marriage,
any better than she should be. The name of Admiral Greystock, as having
been the father of his mistress, had indeed reached his ears, but Andy
Gowran was a suspicious man and felt no confidence even in an admiral--in
regard to whom he heard nothing of his having, or having had, a wife.

"It's my fer-rm opeenion she's jist naebody--and waur," he had said more
than once to his own wife, nodding his head with great emphasis at the
last word. He was very anxious, therefore, to see "her leddyship's"
cousin. Mr. Gowran thought that he knew a gentleman when he saw one. He
thought, also, that he knew a lady, and that he didn't see one when he was
engaged with his mistress. Cousin, indeed! "For the matter o' that, ony
man that comes the way may be ca'ed a coosin." So Mr. Gowran was on the
grand sweep before the garden gate and took the pony from Frank's hand.

"Is Lady Eustace at home?" Frank asked. Mr. Gowran perceived that Frank
was a gentleman, and was disappointed. And Frank didn't come as a man
comes who calls himself by a false name, and pretends to be an honest
cousin, when in fact he is something--oh, ever so wicked! Mr. Gowran, who
was a stern moralist, was certainly disappointed at Frank's appearance.

Lizzie was in a little sitting-room, reached by a long passage with steps
in the middle, at some corner of the castle which seemed a long way from
the great door. It was a cheerful little room, with chintz curtains, and a
few shelves laden with brightly-bound books, which had been prepared for
Lizzie immediately on her marriage. It looked out upon the sea, and she
had almost taught herself to think that here she had sat with her adored
Florian gazing in mutual ecstasy upon the "wide expanse of glittering
waves." She was lying back in a low armchair as her cousin entered, and
she did not rise to receive him. Of course she was alone, Miss Macnulty
having received a suggestion that it would be well that she should do a
little gardening in the moat. "Well, Frank," she said, with her sweetest
smile, as she gave him her hand. She felt and understood the extreme
intimacy which would be implied by her not rising to receive him. As she
could not rush into his arms, there was no device by which she could more
clearly show to him how close she regarded his friendship.

"So I am at Portray Castle at last," he said, still holding her hand.

"Yes--at the dullest, dreariest, deadliest spot in all Christendom, I
think--if Ayrshire be Christendom. But never mind about that now.
Perhaps, as you are at the other side of the mountain at the cottage, we
shall find it less dull here at the castle."

"I thought you were to be so happy here!"

"Sit down and we'll talk it all over by degrees. What will you have--
breakfast or lunch?"

"Neither, thank you."

"Of course you'll stay to dinner?"

"No, indeed. I've a man there at the cottage with me who would cut his
throat in his solitude."

"Let him cut his throat; but never mind now. As for being happy, women are
never happy without men. I needn't tell any lies to you, you know. What
makes me sure that this fuss about making men and women all the same must
be wrong is just the fact that men can get along without women, and women
can't without men. My life has been a burden to me. But never mind. Tell
me about my lord--my lord and master."

"Lord Fawn?"

"Who else? What other lord and master? My bosom's own; my heart's best
hope; my spot of terra firma; my cool running brook of fresh water; my
rock; my love; my lord; my all. Is he always thinking of his absent
Lizzie? Does he still toil at Downing Street? Oh, dear; do you remember,
Frank, when he told us that 'one of us must remain in town'?"

"I have seen him."

"So you wrote me word."

"And I have seen a very obstinate, pig-headed, but nevertheless honest and
truth-speaking gentleman."

"Frank, I don't care twopence for his honesty and truth. If he ill-treats
me----." Then she paused; looking into his face, she had seen at once by
the manner in which he had taken her badinage, without a smile, that it
was necessary that she should be serious as to her matrimonial prospects.
"I suppose I had better let you tell your story," she said, "and I will
sit still and listen."

"He means to ill-treat you."

"And you will let him?"

"You had better listen, as you promised, Lizzie. He declares that the
marriage must be off at once unless you will send those diamonds to Mr.
Camperdown or to the jewellers."

"And by what law or rule does he justify himself in a decision so
monstrous? Is he prepared to prove that the property is not my own?"

"If you ask me my opinion as a lawyer, I doubt whether any such proof can
be shown. But as a man and a friend I do advise you to give them up."

"Never."

"You must, of course, judge for yourself, but that is my advice. You had
better, however, hear my whole story."

"Certainly," said Lizzie. Her whole manner was now changed. She had
extricated herself from the crouching position in which her feet, her
curl, her arms, her whole body had been so arranged as to combine the
charm of her beauty with the charm of proffered intimacy. Her dress was
such as a woman would wear to receive her brother, and yet it had been
studied. She had no gems about her but what she might well wear in her
ordinary life, and yet the very rings on her fingers had not been put on
without reference to her cousin Frank. Her position had been one of
lounging ease, such as a woman might adopt when all alone, giving herself
all the luxuries of solitude; but she had adopted it in special reference
to cousin Frank. Now she was in earnest, with business before her; and
though it may be said of her that she could never forget her appearance in
presence of a man whom she desired to please, her curl and rings, and
attitude were for the moment in the background. She had seated herself on
a common chair, with her hands upon the table, and was looking into
Frank's face with eager, eloquent, and combative eyes. She would take his
law, because she believed in it; but, as far as she could see as yet, she
would not take his advice unless it were backed by his law.

"Mr. Camperdown," continued Greystock, "has consented to prepare a case
for opinion, though he will not agree that the Eustace estate shall be
bound by that opinion."

"Then what's the good of it?"

"We shall at least know, all of us, what is the opinion of some lawyer
qualified to understand the circumstances of the case."

"Why isn't your opinion as good as that of any lawyer?"

"I couldn't give an opinion; not otherwise than as a private friend to
you, which is worth nothing unless for your private guidance. Mr.
Camperdown----"

"I don't care one straw for Mr. Camperdown."

"Just let me finish."

"Oh, certainly; and you mustn't be angry with me, Frank. The matter is so
much to me; isn't it?"

"I won't be angry. Do I look as if I were angry? Mr. Camperdown is right."

"I dare say he may be what you call right. But I don't care about Mr.
Camperdown a bit."

"He has no power, nor has John Eustace any power, to decide that the
property which may belong to a third person shall be jeopardised by any
arbitration. The third person could not be made to lose his legal right by
any such arbitration, and his claim, if made, would still have to be
tried."

"Who is the third person, Frank?"

"Your own child at present."

"And will not he have it any way?"

"Camperdown and John Eustace say that it belongs to him at present. It is
a point that, no doubt, should be settled."

"To whom do you say that it belongs?"

"That is a question I am not prepared to answer."

"To whom do you think that it belongs?"

"I have refused to look at a single paper on the subject, and my opinion
is worth nothing. From what I have heard in conversation with Mr.
Camperdown and John Eustace, I cannot find that they make their case
good."

"Nor can I," said Lizzie.,

"A case is to be prepared for Mr. Dove."

"Who is Mr. Dove?"

"Mr. Dove is a barrister, and no doubt a very clever fellow. If his
opinion be such as Mr. Camperdown expects, he will at once proceed against
you at law for the immediate recovery of the necklace."

"I shall be ready for him," said Lizzie, and as she spoke all her little
feminine softnesses were for the moment laid aside.

"If Mr. Dove's opinion be in your favour----"

"Well," said Lizzie, "what then?"

"In that case Mr. Camperdown, acting on behalf of John Eustace and young
Florian----"

"How dreadful it is to hear of my bitterest enemy acting on behalf of my
own child!" said Lizzie, holding up her hands piteously. "Well?"

"In that case Mr. Camperdown will serve you with some notice that the
jewels are not yours, to part with them as you may please."

"But they will be mine."

"He says not; but in such case he will content himself with taking steps
which may prevent you from selling them."

"Who says that I want to sell them?" demanded Lizzie indignantly.

"Or from giving them away, say to a second husband."

"How little they know me!"

"Now I have told you all about Mr. Camperdown."

"Yes."

"And the next thing is to tell you about Lord Fawn."

"That is everything. I care nothing for Mr. Camperdown; nor yet for Mr.
Dove--if that is his absurd name. Lord Fawn is of more moment to me,
though, indeed, he has given me but little cause to say so."

"In the first place, I must explain to you that Lord Fawn is very
unhappy."

"He may thank himself for it."

"He is pulled this way and that, and is half distraught; but he has stated
with as much positive assurance as such a man can assume, that the match
must be regarded as broken off unless you will at once restore the
necklace."

"He does?"

"He has commissioned me to give you that message; and it is my duty,
Lizzie, as your friend, to tell you my conviction that he repents his
engagement."

She now rose from her chair and began to walk about the room. "He shall
not go back from it. He shall learn that I am not a creature at his own
disposal in that way. He shall find that I have some strength if you have
none."

"What would you have had me do?"

"Taken him by the throat," said Lizzie.

"Taking by the throat in these days seldom forwards any object, unless the
taken one be known to the police. I think Lord Fawn is behaving very
badly, and I have told him so. No doubt he is under the influence of
others--mother and sisters--who are not friendly to you."

"False-faced idiots!" said Lizzie.

"He himself is somewhat afraid of me--is much afraid of you--is afraid of
what people will say of him; and, to give him his due, is afraid also of
doing what is wrong. He is timid, weak, conscientious, and wretched. If
you have set your heart upon marrying him----"

"My heart!" said Lizzie scornfully.

"Or your mind, you can have him by simply sending the diamonds to the
jewellers. Whatever may be his wishes, in that case he will redeem his
word."

"Not for him or all that belongs to him! It wouldn't be much. He's just a
pauper with a name."

"Then your loss will be so much the less."

"But what right has he to treat me so? Did you ever before hear of such a
thing? Why is he to be allowed to go back, without punishment, more than
another?"

"What punishment would you wish?"

"That he should be beaten within an inch of his life; and if the inch were
not there, I should not complain."

"And I am to do it, to my absolute ruin and to your great injury?"

"I think I could almost do it myself." And Lizzie raised her hand as
though there were some weapon in it. "But, Frank, there must be something.
You wouldn't have me sit down and bear it. All the world has been told of
the engagement. There must be some punishment."

"You would not wish to have an action brought for breach of promise?"

"I would wish to do whatever would hurt him most without hurting myself,"
said Lizzie.

"You won't give up the necklace?" said Frank.

"Certainly not," said Lizzie. "Give it up for his sake--a man that I have
always despised?"

"Then you had better let him go."

"I will not let him go. What, to be pointed at as the woman that Lord Fawn
had jilted? Never! My necklace should be nothing more to him than this
ring." And she drew from her finger a little circlet of gold with a stone,
for which she had owed Messrs. Harter & Benjamin five-and-thirty pounds
till Sir Florian had settled that account for her. "What cause can he give
for such treatment?"

"He acknowledges that there is no cause which he can state openly."

"And I am to bear it? And it is you that tell me so? Oh, Frank!"

"Let us understand each other, Lizzie. I will not fight him, that is, with
pistols; nor will I attempt to thrash him. It would be useless to argue
whether public opinion is right or wrong; but public opinion is now so
much opposed to that kind of thing that it is out of the question. I
should injure your position and destroy my own. If you mean to quarrel
with me on that score, you had better say so."

Perhaps at that moment he almost wished that she would quarrel with him,
but she was otherwise disposed. "Oh, Frank," she said, "do not desert me."

"I will not desert you."

"You feel that I am ill-used, Frank."

"I do. I think that his conduct is inexcusable."

"And there is to be no punishment?" she asked, with that strong
indignation at injustice which the unjust always feel when they are
injured.

"If you carry yourself well, quietly and with dignity, the world will
punish him."

"I don't believe a bit of it. I am not a Patient Grizel who can content
myself with heaping benefits on those who injure me, and then thinking
that they are coals of fire. Lucy Morris is one of that sort." Frank ought
to have resented the attack, but he did not. "I have no such tame virtues.
I'll tell him to his face what he is. I'll lead him such a life that he
shall be sick of the very name of a necklace."

"You cannot ask him to marry you."

"I will. What, not ask a man to keep his promise when you are engaged to
him? I am not going to be such a girl as that."

"Do you love him, then?"

"Love him! I hate him. I always despised him, and now I hate him."

"And yet you would marry him?"

"Not for worlds, Frank. No. Because you advised me I thought that I would
do so. Yes, you did, Frank. But for you I would never have dreamed of
taking him. You know, Frank, how it was, when you told me of him and
wouldn't come to me yourself." Now again she was sitting close to him and
had her hand upon his arm. "No, Frank; even to please you I could not
marry him now. But I'll tell you what I'll do. He shall ask me again. In
spite of those idiots at Richmond he shall kneel at my feet, necklace or
no necklace; and then--then I'll tell him what I think of him. Marry him!
I would not touch him with a pair of tongs." As she said this she was
holding her cousin fast by the hand.




CHAPTER XXIV

SHOWING WHAT FRANK GREYSTOCK THOUGHT ABOUT MARRIAGE


It had not been much after noon when Frank Greystock reached Portray
Castle, and it was very nearly five when he left it. Of course he had
lunched with the two ladies, and as the conversation before lunch had been
long and interesting, they did not sit down till near three. Then Lizzie
had taken him out to show him the grounds and garden, and they had
clambered together down to the sea-beach. "Leave me here," she had said
when he insisted on going because of his friend at the cottage. When he
suggested that she would want help to climb back up the rocks to the
castle, she shook her head as though her heart was too full to admit of a
consideration so trifling. "My thoughts flow more freely here with the
surge of the water in my ears than they will with that old woman droning
to me. I come here often, and know every rock and every stone." That was
not exactly true, as she had never been down but once before. "You mean to
come again." He told her that of course he should come again. "I will name
neither day nor hour. I have nothing to take me away. If I am not at the
castle, I shall be at this spot. Good-by, Frank." He took her in his arm?
and kissed her, of course as a brother; and then he clambered up, got on
his pony, and rode away.

"I dinna ken just what to mak' o' him," said Gowran to his wife. "May be
he is her coosin; but coosins are nae that sib that a weeder is to be
hailed aboot jist ane as though she were ony quean at a fair." From which
it may be inferred that Mr. Gowran had watched the pair as they were
descending together toward the shore.

Frank had so much to think of, riding back to the cottage, that when he
came to the gap, instead of turning round along the wall down the valley,
he took the track right on across the mountain and lost his way. He had
meant to be back at the cottage by three or four, and yet had made his
visit to the castle so long that without any losing of his way he could
not have been there before seven. As it was, when that hour arrived, he
was up on the top of a hill and could again see Portray Castle clustering
down close upon the sea, and the thin belt of trees and the shining water
beyond; but of the road to the cottage he knew nothing. For a moment he
thought of returning to Portray, till he had taught himself to perceive
that the distance was much greater than it had been from the spot at which
he had first seen the castle in the morning; and then he turned his pony
round and descended on the other side.

His mind was very full of Lizzie Eustace, and full also of Lucy Morris. If
it were to be asserted here that a young man may be perfectly true to a
first young woman while he is falling n love with a second, the readers of
this story would probably be offended. But undoubtedly many men believe
themselves to be quite true while undergoing this process, and many young
women expect nothing else from their lovers. If only he will come right at
last, they are contented. And if he don't come right at all, it is the way
of the world, and the game has to be played over again. Lucy Morris, no
doubt, had lived a life too retired for the learning of such useful
forbearance, but Frank Greystock was quite a proficient. He still
considered himself to be true to Lucy Morris, with a truth seldom found in
this degenerate age--with a truth to which he intended to sacrifice some
of the brightest hopes of his life--with a truth which, after much
thought, he had generously preferred to his ambition. Perhaps there was
found some shade of regret to tinge the merit which he assumed on this
head, in respect of the bright things which it would be necessary that he
should abandon; but if so, the feeling only assisted him in defending his
present conduct from any aspersions his conscience might bring against it.
He intended to marry Lucy Morris, without a shilling, without position, a
girl who had earned her bread as a governess, simply because he loved her.
It was a wonder to himself that he, a lawyer, a man of the world, a member
of Parliament, one who had been steeped up to his shoulders in the ways of
the world, should still be so pure as to be capable of such, a sacrifice.
But it was so; and the sacrifice would undoubtedly be made some day. It
would be absurd in one conscious of such high merit to be afraid of the
ordinary social incidents of life. It is the debauched broken drunkard who
should become a teetotaller, and not the healthy, hard-working father of a
family who never drinks a drop of wine till dinner-time. He need not be
afraid of a glass of champagne when, on a chance occasion, he goes to a
picnic. Frank Greystock was now going to his picnic; and, though he meant
to be true to Lucy Morris, he had enjoyed his glass of champagne with
Lizzie Eustace under the rocks. He was thinking a good deal of his
champagne when he lost his way.

What a wonderful woman was his cousin Lizzie, and so unlike any other girl
he had ever seen! How full she was of energy, how courageous, and, then,
how beautiful! No doubt her special treatment of him was sheer flattery.
He told himself that it was so. But, after all, flattery is agreeable.
That she did like him better than anybody else was probable. He could have
no feeling of the injustice he might do to the heart of a woman who at the
very moment that she was expressing her partiality for him was also
expressing her anger that another man would not consent to marry her. And
then women who have had one husband already are not like young girls in
respect to their hearts. So at least thought Frank Greystock. Then he
remembered the time at which he had intended to ask Lizzie to be his wife
--the very day on which he would have done so had he been able to get away
from that early division at the House--and he asked himself whether he
felt any regret on that score. It would have been very nice to come down
to Portray Castle as to his own mansion after the work of the courts and
of the session. Had Lizzie become his wife, her fortune would have helped
him to the very highest steps beneath the throne. At present he was almost
nobody--because he was so poor, and in debt. It was so, undoubtedly; but
what did all that matter in comparison with the love of Lucy Morris? A man
is bound to be true. And he would be true. Only, as a matter of course,
Lucy must wait.

When he had first kissed his cousin up in London, she suggested that the
kiss was given as by a brother, and asserted that it was accepted as by a
sister. He had not demurred, having been allowed the kiss. Nothing of the
kind had been said under the rocks to-day; but then that fraternal
arrangement, when once made and accepted, remains, no doubt, in force for
a long time. He did like his cousin Lizzie. He liked to feel that he could
be her friend, with the power of domineering over her. She, also, was fond
of her own way, and loved to domineer herself; but the moment that he
suggested to her that there might be a quarrel, she was reduced to a
prayer that he would not desert her. Such a friendship has charms for a
young man, especially if the lady be pretty. As to Lizzie's prettiness, no
man or woman could entertain a doubt. And she had a way of making the most
of herself which it was very hard to resist. Some young women, when they
clamber over rocks, are awkward, heavy, unattractive, and troublesome. But
Lizzie had at one moment touched him as a fairy might have done; had
sprung at another from stone to stone, requiring no help; and then, on a
sudden, had become so powerless that he had been forced almost to carry
her in his arms. That, probably, must have been the moment which induced
Mr. Gowran to liken her to a quean at a fair.

But, undoubtedly, there might be trouble. Frank was sufficiently
experienced in the ways of the world to know that trouble would sometimes
come from young ladies who treat young men like their brothers, when those
young men are engaged to other young ladies. The other young ladies are
apt to disapprove of brothers who are not brothers by absolute right of
birth. He knew also that all the circumstances of his cousin's position
would make it expedient that she should marry a second husband. As he
could not be that second husband--that matter was settled, whether for
good or bad--was he not creating trouble, both for her and for himself?
Then there arose in his mind a feeling, very strange, but by no means
uncommon, that prudence on his part would be mean, because by such
prudence he would be securing safety for himself as well as for her. What
he was doing was not only imprudent, but wrong also, He knew that it was
so. But Lizzie Eustace was a pretty young woman; and when a pretty young
woman is in the case, a man is bound to think neither of what is prudent
nor of what is right. Such was--perhaps his instinct rather than his
theory. For her sake, if not for his own, he should have abstained. She
was his cousin, and was so placed in the world as specially to require
some strong hand to help her. He knew her to be, in truth, heartless,
false, and greedy; but she had so lived that even yet her future life
might be successful. He had called himself her friend as well as cousin,
and was bound to protect her from evil, if protection were possible. But
he was adding to all her difficulties, because she pretended to be in love
with him. He knew that it was pretence; and yet, because she was pretty,
and because he was a man, he could not save her from herself. "It doesn't
do to be wiser than other men," he said to himself as he looked round
about on the bare hill-side. In the mean time he had altogether lost his
way.

It was between nine and ten when he reached the cottage. "Of course you
have dined?" said Herriot.

"Not a bit of it. I left before five, being sure that I could get here in
an hour and a half. I have been riding up and down these dreary hills for
nearly five hours. You have dined?"

"There was a neck of mutton and a chicken. She said the neck of mutton
would keep hot best, so I took the chicken. I hope you like lukewarm neck
of mutton?"

"I am hungry enough to eat anything; not but what I had a first-rate
luncheon. What have you done all day?"

"Stone and Toddy," said Herriot.

"Stick to that. If anything can pull you through, Stone and Toddy will. I
lived upon them for two years."

"Stone and Toddy, with a little tobacco, have been all my comfort. I
began, however, by sleeping for a few hours. Then I went upon the
mountains."

"Did you take a gun?"

"I took it out of the case, but it didn't come right, and so I left it. A
man came to me and said that he was the keeper."

"He'd have put the gun right for you."

"I was too bashful for that. I persuaded him that I wanted to go out alone
and see what birds there were, and at last I induced him to stay here with
the old woman. He's to be at the cottage at nine to-morrow. I hope that is
all right."

In the evening, as they smoked and drank whiskey and water--probably
supposing that to be correct in Ayrshire--they were led on by the combined
warmth of the spirit, the tobacco, and their friendship, to talk about
women. Frank, some month or six weeks since, in a moment of soft
confidence, had told his friend of his engagement with Lucy Morris. Of
Lizzie Eustace he had spoken only as of a cousin whose interests were dear
to him. Her engagement with Lord Fawn was known to all London, and was,
therefore, known to Arthur Herriot. Some distant rumour, however, had
reached him that the course of true love was not running quite smooth, and
therefore on that subject he would not speak, at any rate till Greystock
should first mention it. "How odd it is to find two women living all alone
in a great house like that," Frank had said.

"Because so few women have the means to live in large houses, unless they
live with fathers or husbands."

"The truth is," said Frank, "that women don't do well alone. There is
always a savour of misfortune--or, at least, of melancholy--about a
household which has no man to look after it. With us, generally, old maids
don't keep houses, and widows marry again. No doubt it was an unconscious
appreciation of this feeling which brought about the burning of Indian
widows. There is an unfitness in women for solitude. A female Prometheus,
even without a vulture, would indicate cruelty worse even than Jove's. A
woman should marry--once, twice, and thrice if necessary."

"Women can't marry without men to marry them."

Frank Greystock filled his pipe as he went on with his lecture. "That idea
as to the greater number of women is all nonsense. Of course we are
speaking of our own kind of men and women, and the disproportion of the
numbers in so small a division of the population amounts to nothing. We
have no statistics to tell us whether there be any such disproportion in
classes where men do not die early from overwork."

"More females are born than males."

"That's more than I know. As one of the legislators of the country I am
prepared to state that statistics are always false. What we have to do is
to induce men to marry. We can't do it by statute."

"No, thank God."

"Nor yet by fashion."

"Fashion seems to be going the other way," said Herriot.

"It can be only done by education and conscience. Take men of forty all
round--men of our own class--you believe that the married men are happier
than the unmarried? I want an answer, you know, just for the sake of the
argument."

"I think the married men are the happier. But you speak as the fox who had
lost his tail; or, at any rate, as a fox in the act of losing it."

"Never mind my tail. If morality in life and enlarged affections are
conducive to happiness, it must be so."

"Short commons and unpaid bills are conducive to misery. That's what I
should say if I wanted to oppose you."

"I never came across a man willing to speak the truth who did not admit
that, in the long run, married men are the happier. As regards women,
there isn't even ground for an argument. And yet men don't marry."

"They can't."

"You mean there isn't food enough in the world."

"The man fears that he won't get enough of what there is. for his wife and
family."

"The labourer with twelve shillings a week has no such fear. And if he did
marry, the food would come. It isn't that. The man is unconscientious and
ignorant as to the sources of true happiness, and won't submit himself to
cold mutton and three clean shirts a week--not because he dislikes mutton
and dirty linen himself, but because the world says they are vulgar.
That's the feeling that keeps you from marrying, Herriot."

"As for me," said Herriot, "I regard myself as so placed that I do not
dare to think of a young woman of my own rank except as a creature that
must be foreign to me. I cannot make such a one my friend as I would a
man, because I should be in love with her at once. And I do not dare to be
in love because I would not see a wife and children starve. I regard my
position as one of enforced monasticism, and myself as a monk under the
cruellest compulsion. I often wish that I had been brought up as a
journeyman hatter."

"Why a hatter?"

"I'm told it's an active sort of life. You're fast asleep, and I was just
now, when you were preaching. We'd better go to bed. Nine o'clock for
breakfast, I suppose?"




CHAPTER XXV

MR. DOVE'S OPINION


Mr. Thomas Dove, familiarly known among clubmen, attorney's clerks, and,
perhaps, even among judges when very far from their seats of judgment, as
Turtle Dove, was a counsel learned in the law. He was a counsel so learned
in the law, that there was no question within the limits of an attorney's
capability of putting to him that he could not answer with the aid of his
books. And when he had once given an opinion, all Westminster could not
move him from it--nor could Chancery Lane and Lincoln's Inn and the Temple
added to Westminster. When Mr. Dove had once been positive, no man on
earth was more positive. It behooved him, therefore, to be right when he
was positive; and though, whether wrong or right, he was equally stubborn,
it must be acknowledged that he was seldom proved to be wrong.
Consequently the attorneys believed in him, and he prospered. He was a
thin man, over fifty years of age, very full of scorn and wrath, impatient
of a fool, and thinking most men to be fools; afraid of nothing on earth--
and, so his enemies said, of nothing elsewhere; eaten up by conceit; fond
of law, but fonder, perhaps, of dominion; soft as milk to those who
acknowledged his power, but a tyrant to all who contested it;
conscientious, thoughtful, sarcastic, bright-witted, and laborious. He was
a man who never spared himself. If he had a case in hand, though the
interest to himself in it was almost nothing, he would rob himself of rest
for a week, should a point arise which required such labour. It was the
theory of Mr. Dove's life that he would never be beaten. Perhaps it was
some fear in this respect that had kept him from Parliament and confined
him to the courts and the company of attorneys. He was, in truth, a
married man with a family; but they who knew him as the terror of
opponents and as the divulger of legal opinions heard nothing of his wife
and children. He kept all such matters quite to himself, and was not given
to much social intercourse with those among whom his work lay. Out at
Streatham, where he lived, Mrs. Dove probably had her circle of
acquaintance; but Mr. Dove's domestic life and his forensic life were kept
quite separate.

At the present moment Mr. Dove is interesting to us solely as being the
learned counsel in whom Mr. Camperdown trusted--to whom Mr. Camperdown was
willing to trust for an opinion in so grave a matter as that of the
Eustace diamonds. A case was made out and submitted to Mr. Dove
immediately after that scene on the pavement in Mount Street at which Mr.
Camperdown had endeavoured to induce Lizzie to give up the necklace; and
the following is the opinion which Mr. Dove gave:

"There is much error about heirlooms. Many think that any chattel may be
made an heirloom by any owner of it. This is not the case. The law,
however, does recognise heirlooms; as to which the Exors. or Admors. are
excluded in favour of the successor; and when there are such heirlooms
they go to the heir by special custom. Any devise of an heirloom is
necessarily void, for the will takes place after death, and the heirloom
is already vested in the heir by custom. We have it from Littleton that
law prefers custom to devise.

"Brooke says that the best thing of every sort may be an heirloom--such as
the best bed, the best table, the best pot or pan.

"Coke says that heirlooms are so by custom, and not by law.

"Spelman says, in denning an heirloom, that it may be 'Omne utensil
robustius;' which would exclude a necklace.

"In the 'Termes de Ley,' it is denned as, 'Ascun parcel des utensils.'

"We are told in 'Coke upon Littleton' that crown jewels are heirlooms,
which decision--as far as it goes--denies the right to other jewels.

"Certain chattels may undoubtedly be held and claimed as being in the
nature of heirlooms--as swords, pennons of honour, garter and collar of
S.S. See case of the Earl of Northumberland; and that of the Pusey horn--
Pusey v. Pusey. The journals of the House of Lords, delivered officially
to peers, may be so claimed. See Upton v. Lord Ferrers.

"A devisor may clearly devise or limit the possession of chattels, making
them inalienable by devisees in succession. But in such cases they will
become the absolute possession of the first person seized in tail, even
though an infant, and in case of death without will would go to the Exors.
Such arrangement, therefore, can only hold good for lives in existence and
for 21 years afterwards. Chattels so secured would not be heirlooms. See
Carr v. Lord Errol, 14 Vesey, and Rowland v. Morgan.

"Lord Eldon remarks that such chattels held in families are 'rather
favourites of the court.' This was in the Ormonde case. Executors,
therefore, even when setting aside any claim as for heirlooms, ought not
to apply such property in payment of debts unless obliged.

"The law allows of claims for paraphernalia for widows, and, having
adjusted such claims, seems to show that the claim may be limited.

"If a man deliver cloth to his wife, and die, she shall have it, though
she had not fashioned it into the garment intended.

"Pearls and jewels, even though only worn on state occasions, may go to
the widow as paraphernalia, but with a limit. In the case of Lady Douglas,
she being the daughter of an Irish Earl and widow of the King's sergeant
(temp. Car. I.), it was held that £370 was not too much, and she was
allowed a diamond and a pearl chain to that value.

"In 1674 Lord Keeper Finch declared that he would never allow
paraphernalia, except to the widow of a nobleman.

"But in 1721 Lord Macclesfield gave Mistress Tipping paraphernalia to the
value or £200--whether so persuaded by law and precedent, or otherwise,
may be uncertain.

"Lord Talbot allowed a gold watch as paraphernalia.

"Lord Hardwicke went much further, and decided that Mrs. Northey was
entitled to wear jewels to the value of £3,000, saying that value made no
difference; but seems to have limited the nature of her possession in the
jewels by declaring her to be entitled to wear them only when full-
dressed.

"It is, I think, clear that the Eustace estate cannot claim the jewels as
an heirloom. They are last mentioned, and, so far as I know, only
mentioned as an heirloom in the will of the great-grandfather of the
present baronet, if these be the diamonds then named by him. As such he
could not have devised them to the present claimant, as he died in 1820,
and the present claimant is not yet two years old.

"Whether the widow could claim them as paraphernalia is more doubtful. I
do not know that Lord Hardwicke's ruling would decide the case; but if so,
she would, I think, be debarred from selling, as he limits the use of
jewels of lesser value than these to the wearing of them when full-
dressed. The use being limited, possession with power of alienation cannot
be intended.

"The lady's claim to them as a gift from her husband amounts to nothing.
If they are not hers by will, and it seems that they are not so, she can
only hold them as paraphernalia belonging to her station.

"I presume it to be capable of proof that the diamonds were not in
Scotland when Sir Florian made his will or when he died. The former fact
might be used as tending to show his intention when the will was made. I
understand that he did leave to his widow by will all the chattels in
Portray Castle. J. D.

"15 August, 18--."

When Mr. Camperdown had twice read this opinion, he sat in his chair an
unhappy old man. It was undoubtedly the case that he had been a lawyer for
upward of forty years, and had always believed that any gentleman could
make any article of value an heirloom in his family. The title-deeds of
vast estates had been confided to his keeping, and he had had much to do
with property of every kind; and now he was told that in reference to
property of a certain description--property which by its nature could
belong only to such as they who were his clients--he had been long without
any knowledge whatsoever. He had called this necklace an heirloom to John
Eustace above a score of times; and now he was told by Mr. Dove not only
that the necklace was not an heirloom, but that it couldn't have been an
heirloom. He was a man who trusted much in a barrister, as was natural
with an attorney; but he was now almost inclined to doubt Mr. Dove. And he
was hardly more at ease in regard to the other clauses of the opinion. Not
only could not the estate claim the necklace as an heirloom, but that
greedy siren, that heartless snake, that harpy of a widow--for it was thus
that Mr. Camperdown in his solitude spoke to himself of poor Lizzie,
perhaps throwing in a harder word or two--that female swindler could claim
it as--paraphernalia!

There was a crumb of comfort for him in the thought that he could force
her to claim that privilege from a decision of the Court of Queen's Bench,
and that her greed would be exposed should she do so. And she could be
prevented from selling the diamonds. Mr. Dove seemed to make that quite
clear. But then there came that other question as to the inheritance of
the property under the husband's will. That Sir Florian had not intended
that she should inherit the necklace, Mr. Camperdown was quite certain. On
that point he suffered no doubt. But would he be able to prove that the
diamonds had never been in Scotland since Sir Florian's marriage? He had
traced their history from that date with all the diligence he could use,
and he thought that he knew it. But it might be doubtful whether he could
prove it. Lady Eustace had first stated--had so stated before she had
learned the importance of any other statement--that Sir Florian had given
her the diamonds in London as they passed through London from Scotland to
Italy, and that she had carried them thence to Naples, where Sir Florian
had died. If this were so, they could not have been at Portray Castle till
she took them there as a widow, and they would undoubtedly be regarded as
a portion of that property which Sir Florian habitually kept in London.
That this was so Mr. Camperdown. entertained no doubt. But now the widow
alleged that Sir Florian had given the necklace to her in Scotland,
whither they had gone immediately after their marriage, and that she
herself had brought them up to London. They had been married on the 5th of
September; and by the jewellers' books it was hard to tell whether the
trinket had been given up to Sir Florian on the 4th or 24th of September.
On the 24th Sir Florian and his young bride had undoubtedly been in
London. Mr. Camperdown anathematised the carelessness of everybody
connected with Messrs. Garnett's establishment. "Those sort of people have
no more idea of accuracy than--than--;" than he had had of heirlooms, his
conscience whispered to him, filling up the blank.

Nevertheless he thought he could prove that the necklace was first put
into Lizzie's hands in London. The middle-aged and very discreet man at
Messrs. Garnett's, who had given up the jewel-case to Sir Florian, was
sure that he had known Sir Florian to be a married man when he did so. The
lady's maid who had been in Scotland with Lady Eustace, and who was now
living in Turin, having married a courier, had given evidence before an
Italian man of law, stating that she had never seen the necklace till she
came to London. There were, moreover, the probabilities of the case. Was
it likely that Sir Florian should take such a thing down in his pocket to
Scotland? And there was the statement as first made by Lady Eustace
herself to her cousin Frank, repeated by him to John Eustace, and not to
be denied by any one. It was all very well for her now to say that she had
forgotten; but would any one believe that on such a subject she could
forget?

But still the whole thing was very uncomfortable. Mr. Dove's opinion, if
seen by Lady Eustace and her friends, would rather fortify them than
frighten them. Were she once to get hold of that word paraphernalia, it
would be as a tower of strength to her. Mr. Camperdown specially felt
this, that whereas he had hitherto believed that no respectable attorney
would take up such a case as that of Lady Eustace, he could not now but
confess to himself that any lawyer seeing Mr. Dove's opinion would be
justified in taking it up. And yet he was as certain as ever that the
woman was robbing the estate which it was his duty to guard, and that
should he cease to be active in the matter the necklace would be broken up
and the property sold and scattered before a year was out, and then the
woman would have got the better of him! "She shall find that we have not
done with her yet," he said to himself, as he wrote a line to John
Eustace.

But John Eustace was out of town, as a matter of course; and on the next
day Mr. Camperdown himself went down and joined his wife and family at a
little cottage which he had at Dawlish. The necklace, however, interfered
much with his holiday.




CHAPTER XXVI

MR. GOWRAN IS VERY FUNNY


Frank Greystock certainly went over to Portray too often--so often that
the pony was proved to be quite necessary. Miss Macnulty held her tongue
and was gloomy, believing that Lady Eustace was still engaged to Lord
Fawn, and feeling that in that case there should not be so many visits to
the rocks. Mr. Gowran was very attentive, and could tell on any day, to
five minutes, how long the two cousins were sitting together on the
seashore. Arthur Herriot, who cared nothing for Lady Eustace, but who knew
that his friend had promised to marry Lucy Morris, was inclined to be
serious on the subject; but--as is always the case with men--was not
willing to speak about it.

Once, and once only, the two men dined together at the castle, for the
doing of which it was necessary that a gig should be hired all the way
from Prestwick. Herriot had not been anxious to go over, alleging various
excuses--the absence of dress clothes, the calls of Stone and Toddy, his
bashfulness, and the absurdity of paying fifteen shillings for a gig. But
he went at last, constrained by his friend, and a very dull evening he
passed. Lizzie was quite unlike her usual self, was silent, grave, and
solemnly courteous; Miss Macnulty had not a word to say for herself; and
even Frank was dull. Arthur Herriot had not tried to exert himself, and
the dinner had been a failure.

"You don't think much of my cousin, I dare say," said Frank, as they were
driving back.

"She is a very pretty woman."

"And I should say that she does not think much of you."

"Probably not."

"Why on earth wouldn't you speak to her? I went on making speeches to Miss
Macnulty on purpose to give you a chance. Lizzie generally talks about as
well--as any young woman I know; but you had not a word to say to her, nor
she to you."

"Because you devoted yourself to Miss Mac---- whatever her name is."

"That's nonsense," said Frank; "Lizzie and I are more like brother and
sister than anything else. She has no one else belonging to her, and she
has to come to me for advice, and all that sort of thing. I wanted you to
like her."

"I never like people and people never like me. There is an old saying that
you should know a man seven years before you poke his fire. I want to know
persons seven years before I can ask them how they do. To take me out to
dine in this way was of all things the most hopeless."

"But you do dine out in London."

"That's different. There's a certain routine of conversation going, and
one falls into it. At such affairs as that this evening one has to be
intimate or it is a bore. I don't mean to say anything against Lady
Eustace. Her beauty is undeniable, and I don't doubt her cleverness."

"She is sometimes too clever," said Frank.

"I hope she is not becoming too clever for you. You've got to remember
that you're due elsewhere; eh, old fellow?" This was the first word that
Herriot had said on the subject, and to that word Frank Greystock made no
answer. But it had its effect, as also did the gloomy looks of Miss
Macnulty, and the not unobserved presence of Mr. Andy Gowran on various
occasions.

Between them they shot more grouse--so the keeper swore--than had ever
been shot on these mountains before. Herriot absolutely killed one or two
himself, to his own great delight, and Frank, who was fairly skilful,
would get four or five in a day. There were excursions to be made, and the
air of the hills was in itself a treat to both of them. Though Greystock
was so often away at the castle, Herriot did not find the time hang
heavily on his hands, and was sorry when his fortnight was over. "I think
I shall stay a couple of days longer," Frank said, when Herriot spoke of
their return. "The truth is, I must see Lizzie again. She is bothered by
business, and I have to see her about a letter that came this morning. You
needn't pull such a long face. There's nothing of the kind you're thinking
of."

"I thought so much of what you once said to me about another girl that I
hope she at any rate may never be in trouble."

"I hope she never may, on my account," said Frank. "And what troubles she
may have, as life will be troublesome, I trust that I may share and
lessen."

On that evening Herriot went, and on the next morning Frank Greystock
again rode over to Portray Castle; but when he was alone after Herriot's
departure he wrote a letter to Lucy Morris. He had expressed a hope that
he might never be a cause of trouble to Lucy Morris, and he knew that his
silence would trouble her. There could be no human being less inclined to
be suspicious than Lucy Morris. Of that Frank was sure. But there had been
an express stipulation with Lady Fawn that she should be allowed to
receive letters from him, and she would naturally be vexed when he did not
write to her. So he wrote.

"PORTRAY COTTAGE, September 3, 18--.

"DEAREST LUCY: We have been here for a fortnight, shooting grouse,
wandering about the mountains, and going to sleep on the hillsides. You
will say that there never was a time so fit for the writing of letters,
but that will be because you have not learned yet that the idler people
are the more inclined they are to be idle. We hear of lord chancellors
writing letters to their mothers every day of their lives; but men who
have nothing on earth to do cannot bring themselves to face a sheet of
paper. I would promise that when I am lord chancellor I would write to you
every day were it not that when that time comes I shall hope to be always
with you.

"And, in truth, I have had to pay constant visits to my cousin, who lives
in a big castle on the seaside, ten miles from here, over the mountains,
and who is in a peck of troubles; in spite of her prosperity one of the
unhappiest women, I should say, that you could meet anywhere. You know so
much of her affairs that without breach of trust I may say so much. I Wish
she had a father or a brother to manage her matters for her; but she has
none, and I cannot desert her. Your Lord Fawn is behaving badly to her;
and so, as far as I can see, are the people who manage the Eustace
property. Lizzie, as you know, is not the most tractable of women, and
altogether I have more to do in the matter than I like. Riding ten times
backwards and forwards so often over the same route on a little pony is
not good fun, but I am almost glad the distance is not less. Otherwise I
might have been always there. I know you don't quite like Lizzie, but she
is to be pitied.

"I go up to London on Friday, but shall only be there for one or two days,
that is, for one night. I go almost entirely on her business, and must, I
fear, be here again, or at the castle, before I can settle myself either
for work or happiness. On Sunday night I go down to Bobsborough, where,
indeed, I ought to have been earlier. I fear I cannot go to Richmond on
the Saturday, and on the Sunday Lady Fawn would hardly make me welcome. I
shall be at Bobsborough for about three weeks, and there, if you have
commands to give, I will obey them.

"I may, however, tell you the truth at once--though it is a truth you must
keep very much to yourself. In the position in which I now stand as to
Lord Fawn--being absolutely forced to quarrel with him on Lizzie's behalf
--Lady Fawn could hardly receive me with comfort to herself. She is the
best of women; and, as she is your dear friend, nothing is further from me
than any idea of quarrelling with her; but of course she takes her son's
part, and I hardly know how all allusion to the subject could be avoided.

"This, however, dearest, need ruffle no feather between you and me, who
love each other better than we love either the Fawns or the Lizzies. Let
me find a line at my chambers to say that it is so and always shall be so.

"God bless my own darling.

"Ever and always your own,

"F. G."

On the following day he rode over to the castle. He had received a letter
from John Eustace, who had found himself forced to run up to London to
meet Mr. Camperdown. The lawyer had thought to postpone further
consideration of the whole matter till he and everybody else would be
naturally in London--till November that might be, or perhaps even till
after Christmas. But his mind was ill at ease; and he knew that so much
might be done with the diamonds in four months! They might even now be in
the hands of some Benjamin or of some Harter, and it might soon be beyond
the power either of lawyers or of policemen to trace them. He therefore
went up from Dawlish and persuaded John Eustace to come from Yorkshire. It
was a great nuisance, and Eustace freely anathematised the necklace. "If
only some one would steal it, so that we might hear no more of the thing,"
he said. But, as Mr. Camperdown had frequently remarked, the value was too
great for trifling, and Eustace went up to London. Mr. Camperdown put into
his hands the Turtle Dove's opinion, explaining that it was by no means
expedient that it should be shown to the other party. Eustace thought that
the opinion should be common to them all. "We pay for it," said Mr.
Camperdown, "and they can get their opinion from any other barrister if
they please." But what was to be done? Eustace declared that as to the
present whereabouts of the necklace he did not in the least doubt that he
could get the truth from Frank Greystock. He therefore wrote to Greystock,
and with that letter in his pocket Frank rode over to the castle for the
last time.

He, too, was heartily sick of the necklace; but unfortunately he was not
equally sick of her who held it in possession. And he was, too, better
alive to the importance of the value of the trinket than John Eustace,
though not so keenly as was Mr. Camperdown. Lady Eustace was out somewhere
among the cliffs, the servant said. He regretted this as he followed her,
but he was obliged to follow her. Half-way down to the seashore, much
below the knob on which she had attempted to sit with her Shelley, but yet
not below the need of assistance, he found her seated in a little ravine.
"I knew you would come," she said. Of course she had known that he would
come. She did not rise, or even give him her hand, but there was a spot
close beside her on which it was to be presumed that he would seat
himself. She had a volume of Byron in her hand--the "Corsair," "Lara," and
the "Giaour"--a kind of poetry which was in truth more intelligible to her
than "Queen Mab." "You go to-morrow?"

"Yes; I go to-morrow."

"And Lubin has gone?" Arthur Herriot was Lubin.

"Lubin has gone. Though why Lubin I cannot guess. The normal Lubin to me
is a stupid fellow always in love. Herriot is not stupid and is never in
love."

"Nevertheless, he is Lubin if I choose to call him so. Why did he twiddle
his thumbs instead of talking? Have you heard anything of Lord Fawn?"

"I have had a letter from your brother-in-law."

"And what is John the Just pleased to say?"

"John the Just, which is a better name for the man than the other, has
been called up to London, much against his will, by Mr. Camperdown."

"Who is Samuel the Unjust." Mr. Camperdown's name was Samuel.

"And now wants to know where this terrible necklace is at this present
moment." He paused a moment, but Lizzie did not answer him. "I suppose you
have no objection to telling me where it is."

"None in the least, or to giving it you to keep for me, only that I would
not so far trouble you. But I have an objection to telling them. They are
my enemies. Let them find out."

"You are wrong, Lizzie. You do not want, or at any rate should not want,
to have any secret in the matter."

"They are here, in the castle; in the very place in which Sir Florian kept
them when he gave them to me. Where should my own jewels be but in my own
house? What does that Mr. Dove say who was to be asked about them? No
doubt they can pay a barrister to say anything."

"Lizzie, you think too hardly of people."

"And do not people think too hardly of me? Does not all this amount to an
accusation against me that I am a thief? Am I not persecuted among them?
Did not this impudent attorney stop me in the public street and accuse me
of theft before my very servants? Have they not so far succeeded in
misrepresenting me that the very man who is engaged to be my husband
betrays me? And now you are turning against me? Can you wonder that I am
hard?"

"I am not turning against you."

"Yes; you are. You take their part and not mine in everything. I tell you
what, Frank, I would go out in that boat that you see yonder and drop the
bauble into the sea did I not know that they'd drag it up again with their
devilish ingenuity. If the stones would burn I would burn them. But the
worst of it all is that you are becoming my enemy." Then she burst into
violent and almost hysteric tears.

"It will be better that you should give them into the keeping of some one
whom you can both trust, till the law has decided to whom they belong."

"I will never give them up. What does Mr. Dove say?"

"I have not seen what Mr. Dove says. It is clear that the necklace is not
an heirloom."

"Then how dare Mr. Camperdown say so often that it was?"

"He said what he thought," pleaded Frank.

"And he is a lawyer!"

"I am a lawyer, and I did not know what is or what is not an heirloom. But
Mr. Dove is clearly of opinion that such a property could not have been
given away simply by a word of mouth." John Eustace in his letter had made
no allusion to that complicated question of paraphernalia.

"But it was," said Lizzie. "Who can know but myself, when no one else was
present?"

"The jewels are here now?"

"Not in my pocket. I do not carry them about with me. They are in the
castle."

"And will they go back with you to London?"

"Was ever lady so interrogated? I do not know yet that I shall go back to
London. Why am I asked such questions? As to you, Frank, I would tell you
everything, my whole heart, if only you cared to know it. But why is John
Eustace to make inquiry as to personal ornaments which are my own
property? If I go to London I will take them there, and wear them at every
house I enter. I will do so in defiance of Mr. Camperdown and Lord Fawn. I
think, Frank, that no woman was ever so ill-treated as I am."

He himself thought that she was ill-treated. She had so pleaded her case,
and had been so lovely in her tears and her indignation, that he began to
feel something like true sympathy for her cause. What right had he, or had
Mr. Camperdown, or any one, to say that the jewels did not belong to her?
And if her claim to them was just, why should she be persuaded to give up
the possession of them? He knew well that were she to surrender them with
the idea that they should be restored to her if her claim were found to be
just, she would not get them back very soon. If once the jewels were safe,
locked up in Mr. Garnett's strong box, Mr. Camperdown would not care how
long it might be before a jury or a judge should have decided on the case.
The burden of proof would then be thrown upon Lady Eustace. In order that
she might recover her own property she would have to thrust herself
forward as a witness, and appear before the world a claimant, greedy for
rich ornaments. Why should he advise her to give them up? "I am only
thinking," said he, "what may be the best for your own peace."

"Peace!" she exclaimed. "How am I to have peace? Remember the condition in
which I find myself! Remember the manner in which that man is treating me,
when all the world has been told of my engagement to him! When I think of
it my heart is so bitter that I am inclined to throw, not the diamonds,
but myself, from off the rocks. All that remains to me is the triumph of
getting the better of my enemies. Mr. Camperdown shall never have the
diamonds. Even if they could prove that they did not belong to me they
should find them--gone."

"I don't think they can prove it."

"I'll flaunt them in the eyes of all of them till they do; and then--they
shall be gone. And I'll have such revenge on Lord Fawn before I have done
with him that he shall know that it may be worse to have to fight a woman
than a man. Oh, Frank, I do not think that I am hard by nature, but these
things make a woman hard." As she spoke she took his hand in hers, and
looked up into his eyes through her tears. "I know that you do not care
for me and you know how much I care for you."

"Not care for you, Lizzie?"

"No; that little thing at Richmond is everything to you. She is tame and
quiet, a cat that will sleep on the rug before the fire, and you think
that she will never scratch. Do not suppose that I mean to abuse her. She
was my dear friend before you had ever seen her. And men, I know, have
tastes which women do not understand. You want what you call--repose."

"We seldom know what we want, I fancy. We take what the gods send us."
Frank's words were perhaps more true than wise. At the present moment the
gods had clearly sent Lizzie Eustace to him, and unless he could call up
some increased strength of his own, quite independent of the gods, or of
what we may perhaps call chance, he would have to put up with the article
sent.

Lizzie had declared that she would not touch Lord Fawn with a pair of
tongs, and in saying so had resolved that she could not and would not now
marry his lordship, even were his lordship in her power. It had been
decided by her as quickly as thoughts flash, but it was decided. She would
torture the unfortunate lord, but not torture him by becoming his wife.
And, so much being fixed as the stars in heaven, might it be possible that
she should even yet induce her cousin to take the place that had been
intended for Lord Fawn? After all that had passed between them she need
hardly hesitate to tell him of her love. And with the same flashing
thoughts she declared to herself that she did love him, and that therefore
this arrangement would be so much better than that other one which she had
proposed to herself. The reader, perhaps, by this time, has not a high
opinion of Lady Eustace, and may believe that among other drawbacks on her
character there is especially this, that she was heartless. But that was
by no means her own opinion of herself. She would have described herself--
and would have meant to do so with truth--as being all heart. She probably
thought that an over--amount of heart was the malady under which she
specially suffered. Her heart was overflowing now toward the man who was
sitting by her side. And then it would be so pleasant to punish that
little chit who had spurned her gift and had dared to call her mean! This
man, too, was needy, and she was wealthy. Surely were she to offer herself
to him the generosity of the thing would make it noble. She was still
dissolved in tears and was still hysteric. "Oh, Frank!" she said, and
threw herself upon his breast.

Frank Greystock felt his position to be one of intense difficulty, but
whether this difficulty was increased or diminished by the appearance of
Mr. Andy Gowran's head over a rock at the entrance of the little cave in
which they were sitting it might be difficult to determine. But there was
the head. And it was not a head that just popped itself up and then
retreated, as a head would do that was discovered doing that which made it
ashamed of itself. The head, with its eyes wide open, held its own, and
seemed to say, "Ay, I've caught you, have I?" And the head did speak,
though not exactly in those words. "Coosins!" said the head; and then the
head was wagged. In the meantime Lizzie Eustace, whose back was turned to
the head, raised her own, and looked up into Greystock's eyes for love.
She perceived at once that something was amiss, and, starting to her feet,
turned quickly round.

"How dare you intrude here?" she said to the head.

"Coosins!" replied the head, wagging itself.

It was clearly necessary that Greystock should take some steps, if only
with the object of proving to the impudent factotum that he was not
altogether overcome by the awkwardness of his position. That he was a good
deal annoyed, and that he felt not altogether quite equal to the occasion,
must be acknowledged. "What is it that the man wants?" he said, glaring at
the head.

"Coosins!" said the head, wagging itself again.

"If you don't take yourself off, I shall have to thrash you," said Frank.

"Coosins!" said Andy Gowran, stepping from behind the rock and showing his
full figure. Andy was a man on the wrong side of fifty, and therefore, on
the score of age, hardly fit for thrashing. And he was compact, short,
broad, and as hard as flint; a man bad to thrash, look at it from what
side you would. "Coosins!" he said yet again. "Ye're mair couthie than
coosinly, I'm thinking."

"Andy Gowran, I dismiss you from my service for your impertinence," said
Lady Eustace.

"It's ae one to Andy Gowran for that, my leddie. There's timber and a
world o' things aboot the place as wants proteection on behalf o' the
heir. If your leddieship is minded to be quit o' my services, I'll find a
maister in Mr. Camperdoon, as'll nae allow me to be thrown out o' employ.
Coosins!"

"Walk off from this," said Frank Greystock, coming forward and putting his
hand upon the man's breast. Mr. Gowran repeated the objectionable word yet
once again, and then retired.

Frank Greystock immediately felt how very bad for him was his position.
For the lady, if only she could succeed in her object, the annoyance of
the interruption would not matter much after its first absurdity had been
endured. When she had become the wife of Frank Greystock there would be
nothing remarkable in the fact that she had been found sitting with him in
a cavern by the seashore. But for Frank the difficulty of extricating
himself from his dilemma was great, not in regard to Mr. Gowran, but in
reference to his cousin Lizzie. He might, it was true, tell her that he
was engaged to Lucy Morris; but then why had he not told her so before? He
had not told her so; nor did he tell her on this occasion. When he
attempted to lead her away up the cliff she insisted on being left where
she was. "I can find my way alone," she said, endeavouring to smile
through her tears. "The man has annoyed me by his impudence, that is all.
Go, if you are going."

Of course he was going; but he could not go without a word of tenderness.
"Dear, dear Lizzie," he said, embracing her.

"Frank, you'll be true to me?"

"I will be true to you."

"Then go now," she said. And he went his way up the cliff, and got his
pony, and rode back to the cottage, very uneasy in his mind.




CHAPTER XXVII

LUCY MORRIS MISBEHAVES


Lucy Morris got her letter and was contented. She wanted some
demonstration of love from her lover, but very little sufficed for her
comfort. With her it was almost impossible that a man should be loved and
suspected at the same time. She could not have loved the man, or at any
rate confessed her love, without thinking well of him; and she could not
think good and evil at the same time. She had longed for some word from
him since she last saw him; and now she had got a word. She had known that
he was close to his fair cousin--the cousin whom she despised, and whom,
with womanly instinct, she had almost regarded as a rival. But to her the
man had spoken out; and though he was far away from her, living close to
the fair cousin, she would not allow a thought of trouble on that score to
annoy her. He was her own, and let Lizzie Eustace do her worst, he would
remain her own. But she had longed to be told that he was thinking of her,
and at last the letter had come. She answered it that same night with the
sweetest, prettiest little letter, very short, full of love and full of
confidence. Lady Fawn, she said, was the dearest of women; but what was
Lady Fawn to her, or all the Fawns, compared with her lover? If he could
come to Richmond without disturbance to himself, let him come; but if he
felt that, in the present unhappy condition of affairs between him and
Lord Fawn, it was better that he should stay away, she had not a word to
say in the way of urging him. To see him would be a great delight. But had
she not the greater delight of knowing that he loved her? That was quite
enough to make her happy. Then there was a little prayer that God might
bless him, and an assurance that she was in all things his own, own Lucy.
When she was writing her letter she was in all respects a happy girl.

But on the very next day there came a cloud upon her happiness, not in the
least, however, affecting her full confidence in her lover. It was a
Saturday, and Lord Fawn came down to Richmond. Lord Fawn had seen Mr.
Greystock in London on that day, and the interview had been by no means
pleasant to him. The Under-Secretary of State for India was as dark as a
November day when he reached his mother's house, and there fell upon every
one the unintermittent cold drizzling shower of his displeasure from the
moment in which he entered the house. There was never much reticence among
the ladies at Richmond in Lucy's presence, and since the completion of
Lizzie's unfortunate visit to Fawn Court they had not hesitated to express
open opinions adverse to the prospects of the proposed bride. Lucy herself
could say but little in defence of her old friend, who had lost all claim
upon that friendship since the offer of the bribe had been made, so that
it was understood among them all that Lizzie was to be regarded as a black
sheep; but hitherto Lord Fawn himself had concealed his feelings before
Lucy. Now unfortunately he spoke out, and in speaking was especially
bitter against Frank. "Mr. Greystock has been most insolent," he said as
they were all sitting together in the library after dinner. Lady Fawn made
a sign to him and shook her head. Lucy felt the hot blood fly into both
her cheeks, but at the moment she did not speak. Lydia Fawn put out her
hand beneath the table and took hold of Lucy's.

"We must all remember that he is her cousin," said Augusta,

"His relationship to Lady Eustace cannot justify ungentlemanlike
impertinence to me," said Lord Fawn. "He has dared to use words to me
which would make it necessary that I should call him out, only--"

"Frederic, you shall do nothing of the kind," said Lady Fawn, jumping up
from her chair.

"Oh, Frederic, pray, pray don't," said Augusta, springing on to her
brother's shoulder.

"I am sure Frederic does not mean that," said Amelia.

"Only that nobody does call anybody out now," added the pacific lord. "But
nothing on earth shall ever induce me to speak again to a man who is so
little like a gentleman." Lydia now held Lucy's hand still tighter, as
though to prevent her rising. "He has never forgiven me," continued Lord
Fawn, "because he was so ridiculously wrong about the Sawab."

"I am sure that had nothing to do with it," said Lucy.

"Miss Morris, I shall venture to hold my own opinion," said Lord Fawn.

"And I shall hold mine," said Lucy bravely. "The Sawab of Mygawb had
nothing to do with what Mr. Greystock may have said or done about his
cousin. I am quite sure of it."

"Lucy, you are forgetting yourself," said Lady Fawn.

"Lucy, dear, you shouldn't contradict my brother," said Augusta.

"Take my advice, Lucy, and let it pass by," said Amelia.

"How can I hear such things said and not notice them?" demanded Lucy. "Why
does Lord Fawn say them when I am by?"

Lord Fawn had now condescended to be full of wrath against his mother's
governess. "I suppose I may express my own opinion, Miss Morris, in my
mother's house."

"And I shall express mine," said Lucy. "Mr. Greystock is a gentleman. If
you say that he is not a gentleman, it is not true." Upon hearing these
terrible words spoken, Lord Fawn rose from his seat and slowly left the
room. Augusta followed him with both her arms stretched out. Lady Fawn
covered her face with her hands, and even Amelia was dismayed.

"Oh, Lucy! why could you not hold your tongue?" said Lydia.

"I won't hold my tongue," said Lucy, bursting out into tears. "He is a
gentleman."

Then there was great commotion at Fawn Court. After a few moments Lady
Fawn followed her son without having said a word to Lucy, and Amelia went
with her. Poor Lucy was left with the younger girls, and was no doubt very
unhappy. But she was still indignant and would yield nothing. When
Georgina, the fourth daughter, pointed out to her that, in accordance with
all rules of good breeding, she should have abstained from asserting that
her brother had spoken an untruth, she blazed up again. "It was untrue,"
she said.

"But, Lucy, people never accuse each other of untruth. No lady should use
such a word to a gentleman."

"He should not have said so. He knows that Mr. Greystock is more to me
than all the world."

"If I had a lover," said Nina, "and anybody were to say a word against
him, I know I'd fly at them. I don't know why Frederic is to have it all
his own way."

"Nina, you're a fool," said Diana.

"I do think it was very hard for Lucy to bear," said Lydia. "And I won't
bear it," exclaimed Lucy. "To think that Mr. Greystock should be so mean
as to bear malice about a thing like that wild Indian because he takes his
own cousin's part! Of course I'd better go away. You all think that Mr.
Greystock is an enemy now; but he never can be an enemy to me."

"We think that Lady Eustace is an enemy," said Cecilia, "and a very nasty
enemy, too."

"I did not say a word about Lady Eustace," said Lucy. "But Mr. Greystock
is a gentleman."

About an hour after this Lady Fawn sent for Lucy, and the two were
closeted together for a long time. Lord Fawn was very angry, and had
hitherto altogether declined to overlook the insult offered. "I am bound
to tell you," declared Lady Fawn, with much emphasis, "that nothing can
justify you in having accused Lord Fawn of telling an untruth. Of course,
I was sorry that Mr. Greystock's name should have been mentioned in your
presence; but as it was mentioned, you should have borne what was said
with patience."

"I couldn't be patient, Lady Fawn."

"That is what wicked people say when they commit murder, and then they are
hung for it."

"I'll go away, Lady Fawn--"

"That is ungrateful, my dear. You know that I don't wish you to go away.
But if you behave badly, of course I must tell you of it."

"I'd sooner go away. Everybody here thinks ill of Mr. Greystock. But I
don't think ill of Mr. Greystock, and I never shall. Why did Lord Fawn say
such very hard things about him?"

It was suggested to her that she should be down-stairs early the next
morning, and apologise to Lord Fawn for her rudeness; but she would not,
on that night, undertake to do any such thing. Let Lady Fawn say what she
might, Lucy thought that the injury had been done to her, and not to his
lordship. And so they parted hardly friends. Lady Fawn gave her no kiss as
she went, and Lucy, with obstinate pride, altogether refused to own her
fault. She would only say that she had better go, and when Lady Fawn over
and over again pointed out to her that the last thing that such a one as
Lord Fawn could bear was to be accused of an untruth, she would continue
to say that in that case he should be careful to say nothing that was
untrue. All this was very dreadful, and created great confusion and
unhappiness at Fawn Court. Lydia came into her room that night, and the
two girls talked the matter over for hours. In the morning Lucy was up
early, and found Lord Fawn walking in the grounds. She had been told that
he would probably be found walking in the grounds, if she were willing to
tender to him any apology.

Her mind had been very full of the subject--not only in reference to her
lover, but as it regarded her own conduct. One of the elder Fawn girls had
assured her that under no circumstances could a lady be justified in
telling a gentleman that he had spoken an untruth, and she was not quite
sure but that the law so laid down was right. And then she could not but
remember that the gentleman in question was Lord Fawn, and that she was
Lady Fawn's governess. But Mr. Greystock was her affianced lover, and her
first duty was to him. And then, granting that she herself had been wrong
in accusing Lord Fawn of untruth, she could not refrain from asking
herself whether he had not been much more wrong in saying in her hearing
that Mr. Greystock was not a gentleman? And his offence had preceded her
offence, and had caused it! She hardly knew whether she did or did not owe
an apology to Lord Fawn, but she was quite sure that Lord Fawn owed an
apology to her.

She walked straight up to Lord Fawn, and met him beneath the trees. He was
still black and solemn, and was evidently brooding over his grievance; but
he bowed to her, and stood still as she approached him. "My lord," said
she, "I am very sorry for what happened last night."

"And so was I, very sorry, Miss Morris."

"I think you know that I am engaged to marry Mr. Greystock?"

"I cannot allow that that has anything to do with it."

"When you think that he must be dearer to me than all the world, you will
acknowledge that I couldn't hear hard things said of him without
speaking." His face became blacker than ever, but he made no reply. He
wanted an abject begging of unconditional pardon from the little girl who
loved his enemy. If that were done, he would vouchsafe his forgiveness;
but he was too small by nature to grant it on other terms. "Of course,"
continued Lucy, "I am bound to treat you with special respect in Lady
Fawn's house." She looked almost beseechingly into his face as she paused
for a moment.

"But you treated me with especial disrespect," said Lord Fawn.

"And how did you treat me, Lord Fawn?"

"Miss Morris, I must be allowed, in discussing matters with my mother, to
express my own opinions in such language as I may think fit to use. Mr.
Greystock's conduct to me was--was--was altogether most ungentlemanlike."

"Mr. Greystock is a gentleman."

"His conduct was most offensive, and most ungentlemanlike. Mr. Greystock
disgraced himself."

"It isn't true," said Lucy. Lord Fawn gave one start, and then walked off
to the house as quick as his legs could carry him.




CHAPTER XXVIII

MR. DOVE IN HIS CHAMBERS


The scene between Lord Fawn and Greystock had taken place in Mr.
Camperdown's chambers, and John Eustace had also been present. The lawyer
had suffered considerable annoyance, before the arrival of the two first-
named gentlemen, from reiterated assertions made by Eustace that he would
take no further trouble whatsoever about the jewels. Mr. Camperdown had in
vain pointed out to him that a plain duty lay upon him as executor and
guardian to protect the property on behalf of his nephew; but Eustace had
asserted that, though he himself was comparatively a poor man, he would
sooner replace the necklace out of his own property than be subject to the
nuisance of such a continued quarrel. "My dear John; ten thousand pounds!"
Mr. Camperdown had said. "It is a fortune for a younger son."

"The boy is only two years old, and will have time enough to make fortunes
for his own younger sons, if he does not squander everything. If he does,
ten thousand pounds will make no difference."

"But the justice of the thing, John!"

"Justice may be purchased too dearly."

"Such a harpy as she is, too!" pleaded the lawyer. Then Lord Fawn had come
in, and Greystock had followed immediately afterwards.

"I may as well say at once," said Greystock, "that Lady Eustace is
determined to maintain her right to the property; and that she will not
give up the diamonds till some adequate court of law shall have decided
that she is mistaken in her views. Stop one moment, Mr. Camperdown. I feel
myself bound to go further than that, and express my own opinion that she
is right."

"I can hardly understand such an opinion as coming from you," said Mr.
Camperdown.

"You have changed your mind, at any rate," said John Eustace.

"Not so, Eustace. Mr. Camperdown, you'll be good enough to understand that
my opinion expressed here is that of a friend, and not that of a lawyer.
And you must understand, Eustace," continued Greystock, "that I am
speaking now of my cousin's right to the property. Though the value be
great, I have advised her to give up the custody of it for a while, till
the matter shall be clearly decided. That has still been my advice to her,
and I have in no respect changed my mind. But she feels that she is being
cruelly used, and with a woman's spirit will not, in such circumstances,
yield anything. Mr. Camperdown actually stopped her carriage in the
street."

"She would not answer a line that anybody wrote to her," said the lawyer.

"And I may say plainly--for all here know the circumstances--that Lady
Eustace feels the strongest possible indignation at the manner in which
she is being treated by Lord Fawn."

"I have only asked her to give up the diamonds till the question should be
settled," said Lord Fawn.

"And you backed your request, my lord, by a threat! My cousin is naturally
most indignant; and, my lord, you must allow me to tell you that I fully
share the feeling."

"There is no use in making a quarrel about it," said Eustace.

"The quarrel is already made," replied Greystock. "I am here to tell Lord
Fawn in your presence, and in the presence of Mr. Camperdown, that he is
behaving to a lady with ill-usage, which he would not dare to exercise did
he not know that her position saves him from legal punishment, as do the
present usages of society from other consequences."

"I have behaved to her with every possible consideration," said Lord Fawn.

"That is a simple assertion," said the other. "I have made one assertion,
and you have made another. The world will have to judge between us. What
right have you to take upon yourself to decide whether this thing or that
belongs to Lady Eustace or to any one else?"

"When the thing was talked about I was obliged to have an opinion," said
Lord Fawn, who was still thinking of words in which to reply to the insult
offered him by Greystock without injury to his dignity as an Under-
Secretary of State.

"Your conduct, sir, has been altogether inexcusable." Then Frank turned to
the attorney. "I have been given to understand that you are desirous of
knowing where this diamond necklace is at present. It is at Lady Eustace's
house in Scotland; at Portray Castle." Then he shook hands with John
Eustace, bowed to Mr. Camperdown, and succeeded in leaving the room before
Lord Fawn had so far collected his senses as to be able to frame his anger
into definite words.

"I will never willingly speak to that man again," said Lord Fawn. But as
it was not probable that Greystock would greatly desire any further
conversation with Lord Fawn, this threat did not carry with it any
powerful feeling of severity.

Mr. Camperdown groaned over the matter with thorough vexation of spirit.
It seemed to him as though the harpy, as he called her, would really make
good her case against him, at any rate would make it seem to be good for
so long a time that all the triumph of success would be hers. He knew that
she was already in debt, and gave her credit for a propensity to fast
living, which almost did her an injustice. Of course the jewels would be
sold for half their value, and the harpy would triumph. Of what use to him
or to the estate would be a decision of the courts in his favour when the
diamonds should have been broken up and scattered to the winds of heaven?
Ten thousand pounds! It was, to Mr. Camperdown's mind, a thing quite
terrible that, in a country which boasts of its laws and of the execution
of its laws, such an impostor as was this widow should be able to lay her
dirty, grasping fingers on so great an amount of property, and that there
should be no means of punishing her. That Lizzie Eustace had stolen the
diamonds, as a pickpocket steals a watch, was a fact as to which Mr.
Camperdown had in his mind no shadow of a doubt. And, as the reader knows,
he was right. She had stolen them. Mr. Camperdown knew that she had stolen
them, and was a wretched man. From the first moment of the late Sir
Florian's infatuation about this woman, she had worked woe for Mr.
Camperdown. Mr. Camperdown had striven hard, to the great and almost
permanent offence of Sir Florian, to save Portray from its present
condition of degradation; but he had striven in vain. Portray belonged to
the harpy for her life; and moreover, he himself had been forced to be
instrumental in paying over to the harpy a large sum of Eustace money
almost immediately on her becoming a widow. Then had come the affair of
the diamonds--an affair of ten thousand pounds!--as Mr. Camperdown would
exclaim to himself, throwing his eyes up to the ceiling. And now it seemed
that she was to get the better of him even in that, although there could
not be a shadow of doubt as to her falsehood and fraudulent dishonesty!
His luck in the matter was so bad! John Eustace had no backbone, no
spirit, no proper feeling as to his own family. Lord Fawn was as weak as
water, and almost disgraced the cause by the accident of his adherence to
it. Greystock, who would have been a tower of strength, had turned against
him, and was now prepared to maintain that the harpy was right. Mr.
Camperdown knew that the harpy was wrong, that she was a harpy, and he
would not abandon the cause; but the difficulties in his way were great
and the annoyance to which he was subjected was excessive. His wife and
daughters were still at Dawlish, and he was up in town in September,
simply because the harpy had the present possession of these diamonds.

Mr. Camperdown was a man turned sixty, handsome, grey-haired, healthy,
somewhat florid, and carrying in his face and person external signs of
prosperity and that kind of self-assertion which prosperity always
produces. But they who knew him best were aware that he did not bear
trouble well. In any trouble, such as was this about the necklace, there
would come over his face a look of weakness which betrayed the want of
real inner strength. How many faces one sees which, in ordinary
circumstances, are comfortable, self-asserting, sufficient, and even bold;
the lines of which, under difficulties, collapse and become mean,
spiritless, and insignificant. There are faces which, in their usual form,
seem to bluster with prosperity, but which the loss of a dozen points at
whist will reduce to that currish aspect which reminds one of a dog-whip.
Mr. Camperdown's countenance, when Lord Fawn and Mr. Eustace left him, had
fallen away into this meanness of appearance. He no longer carried himself
as a man owning a dog-whip, but rather as the hound that feared it.

A better attorney for the purposes to which his life was devoted did not
exist in London than Mr. Camperdown. To say that he was honest is nothing.
To describe him simply as zealous would be to fall very short of his
merits. The interests of his clients were his own interests, and the legal
rights of the properties of which he had the legal charge were as dear to
him as his own blood. But it could not be said of him that he was a
learned lawyer. Perhaps in that branch of a solicitor's profession in
which he had been called upon to work, experience goes further than
learning. It may be doubted, indeed, whether it is not so in every branch
of every profession. But it might, perhaps, have been better for Mr.
Camperdown had he devoted more hours of his youth to reading books on
conveyancing. He was now too old for such studies, and could trust only to
the reading of other people. The reading, however, of other people was
always at his command, and his clients were rich men who did not mind
paying for an opinion. To have an opinion from Mr. Dove, or some other
learned gentleman, was the every-day practice of his life; and when he
obtained, as he often did, little coigns of legal vantage and subtle
definitions as to property which were comfortable to him, he would rejoice
to think that he could always have a Dove at his hand to tell him exactly
how far he was justified in going in defence of his clients' interests.
But now there had come to him no comfort from his corner of legal
knowledge. Mr. Dove had taken extraordinary pains in the matter, and had
simply succeeded in throwing over his employer. "A necklace can't be an
heirloom!" said Mr. Camperdown to himself, telling off on his fingers half
a dozen instances in which he had either known or had heard that the head
of a family had so arranged the future possession of the family jewels.
Then he again read Mr. Dove's opinion, and actually took a law-book off
his shelves with the view of testing the correctness of the barrister in
reference to some special assertion. A pot or a pan might be an heirloom,
but not a necklace! Mr. Camperdown could hardly bring himself to believe
that this was law. And then as to paraphernalia! Up to this moment, though
he had been called upon to arrange great dealings in reference to widows,
he had never as yet heard of a claim made by a widow for paraphernalia.
But then the widows with whom he had been called upon to deal had been
ladies quite content to accept the good things settled upon them by the
liberal prudence of their friends and husbands, not greedy, blood-sucking
harpies such as this Lady Eustace. It was quite terrible to Mr. Camperdown
that one of his clients should have fallen into such a pit. _Mors omnibus
est communis._ But to have left such a widow behind one!

"John," he said, opening his door. John was his son and partner, and John
came to him, having been summoned by a clerk from another room. "Just shut
the door. I've had such a scene here; Lord Fawn and Mr. Greystock almost
coming to blows about that horrid woman."

"The Upper House would have got the worst of it, as it usually does," said
the younger attorney.

"And there is John Eustace cares no more what becomes of the property than
if he had nothing to do with it; absolutely talks of replacing the
diamonds out of his own pocket; a man whose personal interest in the
estate is by no means equal to her own."

"He wouldn't do it, you know," said Camperdown Junior, who did not know
the family.

"It's just what he would do," said the father, who did. "There's nothing
they wouldn't give away when once the idea takes them. Think of that woman
having the whole Portray estate, perhaps for the next sixty years--nearly
the fee-simple of the property--just because she made eyes to Sir
Florian."

"That's done and gone, father."

"And here's Dove tells us that a necklace can't be an heirloom unless it
belongs to the Crown."

"Whatever he says, you'd better take his word for it."

"I'm not so sure of that! It can't be. I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go
over and see him. We can file a bill in Chancery, I don't doubt, and prove
that the property belongs to the family and must go by the will. But
she'll sell them before we can get the custody of them."

"Perhaps she has done that already."

"Greystock says they are Portray, and I believe they are. She was wearing
them in London only in July, a day or two before I saw her as she was
leaving town. If anybody like a jeweller had been down at the castle, I
should have heard of it. She hasn't sold 'em yet, but she will."

"She could do that just the same if they were an heirloom."

"No, John. I think not. We could have acted much more quickly and have
frightened her."

"If I were you, father, I'd drop the matter altogether and let John
Eustace replace them if he pleases. We all know that he would never be
called on to do anything of the kind. It isn't our sort of business."

"Not ten thousand pounds!" said Camperdown Senior, to whom the magnitude
of the larceny almost ennobled the otherwise mean duty of catching the
thief. Then Mr. Camperdown rose, and slowly walked across the New Square,
Lincoln's Inn, under the low archway, by the entrance to the old court in
which Lord Eldon used to sit, to the Old Square, in which the Turtle Dove
had built his legal nest on a first floor, close to the old gateway.

Mr. Dove was a gentleman who spent a very great portion of his life in
this somewhat gloomy abode of learning. It was not now term time, and most
of his brethren were absent from London, recruiting their strength among
the Alps, or drinking in vigour for fresh campaigns with the salt sea
breezes off Kent and Sussex, or perhaps shooting deer in Scotland, or
catching fish in Connemara. But Mr. Dove was a man of iron, who wanted no
such recreation. To be absent from his law-books and the black, littered,
ink-stained old table on which he was wont to write his opinions, was, to
him, to be wretched. The only exercise necessary to him was that of
putting on his wig and going into one of the courts that were close to his
chambers; but even that was almost distasteful to him. He preferred
sitting in his old arm-chair, turning over his old books in search of old
cases, and producing opinions which he would be prepared to back against
all the world of Lincoln's Inn. He and Mr. Camperdown had known each other
intimately for many years, and though the rank of the two men in their
profession differed much, they were able to discuss questions of law
without any appreciation of that difference between themselves. The one
man knew much, and the other little; the one was not only learned, but
possessed also of great gifts, while the other was simply an ordinary
clear-headed man of business; but they had sympathies in common which made
them friends; they were both honest and unwilling to sell their services
to dishonest customers; and they equally entertained a deep-rooted
contempt for that portion of mankind who thought that property could be
managed and protected without the intervention of lawyers. The outside
world to them was a world of pretty, laughing, ignorant children; and
lawyers were the parents, guardians, pastors, and masters, by whom the
children should be protected from the evils incident to their
childishness.

"Yes, sir; he's here," said the Turtle Dove's clerk. "He is talking of
going away, but he won't go. He's told me I can have a week, but I don't
know that I like to leave him. Mrs. Dove and the children are down at
Ramsgate, and he's here all night. He hadn't been out for so long that
when he wanted to go as far as the Temple yesterday we couldn't find his
hat." Then the clerk opened the door, and ushered Mr. Camperdown into the
room. Mr. Dove was the younger man by five or six years, and his hair was
still black. Mr. Camperdown's was nearer white than gray; but,
nevertheless, Mr. Camperdown looked as though he were the younger man. Mr.
Dove was a long, thin man, with a stoop in his shoulders, with deep-set,
hollow eyes, and lantern cheeks, and sallow complexion, with long, thin
hands, who seemed to acknowledge by every movement of his body and every
tone of his voice that old age was creeping on him; whereas the attorney's
step was still elastic, and his speech brisk. Mr. Camperdown wore a blue
frock-coat, and a coloured cravat, and a light waist-coat. With Mr. Dove
every visible article of his raiment was black, except his shirt, and he
had that peculiar blackness which a man achieves when he wears a dress-
coat over a high black waistcoat in the morning.

"You didn't make much, I fear, of what I sent you about heirlooms," said
Mr. Dove, divining the purport of Mr. Camperdown's visit.

"A great deal more than I wanted, I can assure you, Mr. Dove."

"There is a common error about heirlooms."

"Very common, indeed, I should say. God bless my soul! when one knows how
often the word occurs in family deeds, it does startle one to be told that
there isn't any such thing."

"I don't think I said quite so much as that. Indeed, I was careful to
point out that the law does acknowledge heirlooms."

"But not diamonds," said the attorney.

"I doubt whether I went quite so far as that."

"Only the Crown diamonds."

"I don't think I even debarred all other diamonds. A diamond in a star of
honour might form a part of an heirloom; but I do not think that a diamond
itself could be an heirloom."

"If in a star of honour, why not in a necklace?" argued Mr. Camperdown
almost triumphantly.

"Because a star of honour, unless tampered with by fraud, would naturally
be maintained in its original form. The setting of a necklace will
probably be altered from generation to generation. The one, like a picture
or a precious piece of furniture----"

"Or a pot or a pan," said Mr. Camperdown, with sarcasm.

"Pots and pans may be precious, too," replied Mr. Dove. "Such things can
be traced, and can be held as heirlooms without imposing too great
difficulties on their guardians. The Law is generally very wise and
prudent, Mr. Camperdown; much more so often than are they who attempt to
improve it."

"I quite agree with you there, Mr. Dove."

"Would the Law do a service, do you think, if it lent its authority to the
special preservation in special hands of trinkets only to be used for
vanity and ornament? Is that a kind of property over which an owner should
have a power of disposition more lasting, more autocratic, than is given
him even in regard to land? The land, at any rate, can be traced. It is a
thing fixed and known. A string of pearls is not only alterable, but
constantly altered, and cannot easily be traced."

"Property of such enormous value should, at any rate, be protected," said
Mr. Camperdown indignantly.

"All property is protected, Mr. Camperdown; although, as we know too well,
such protection can never be perfect. But the system of heirlooms, if
there can be said to be such a system, was not devised for what you and I
mean when we talk of protection of property."

"I should have said that that was just what it was devised for."

"I think not. It was devised with the more picturesque idea of maintaining
chivalric associations. Heirlooms have become so, not that the future
owners of them may be assured of so much wealth, whatever the value of the
thing so settled may be, but that the son or grandson or descendant may
enjoy the satisfaction which is derived from saying, My father or my
grandfather or my ancestor sat in that chair, or looked as he now looks in
that picture, or was graced by wearing on his breast that very ornament
which you now see lying beneath the glass. Crown jewels are heirlooms in
the same way, as representing not the possession of the sovereign, but the
time-honoured dignity of the Crown. The Law, which, in general, concerns
itself with our property or lives and our liberties, has in this matter
bowed gracefully to the spirit of chivalry and has lent its aid to
romance! but it certainly did not do so to enable the discordant heirs of
a rich man to settle a simple dirty question of money, which, with
ordinary prudence, the rich-man should himself have settled before he
died."

The Turtle Dove had spoken with emphasis and had spoken well, and Mr.
Camperdown had not ventured to interrupt him while he was speaking. He was
sitting far back on his chair, but with his neck bent and with his head
forward, rubbing his long thin hands slowly over each other, and with his
deep bright eyes firmly fixed on his companion's face. Mr. Camperdown had
not unfrequently heard him speak in the same fashion before, and was
accustomed to his manner of unravelling the mysteries and searching into
the causes of Law with a spirit which almost lent a poetry to the subject.
When Mr. Dove would do so, Mr. Camperdown would not quite understand the
words spoken, but he would listen to them with an undoubting reverence.
And he did understand them in part, and was conscious of an infusion of a
certain amount of poetic spirit into his own bosom. He would think of
these speeches afterwards, and would entertain high but somewhat cloudy
ideas of the beauty and the majesty of Law. Mr. Dove's speeches did Mr.
Camperdown good, and helped to preserve him from that worst of all
diseases, a low idea of humanity.

"You think, then, we had better not claim them as heirlooms?" he asked.

"I think you had better not."

"And you think that she could claim them--as paraphernalia?"

"That question has hardly been put to me, though I allowed myself to
wander into it. But for my intimacy with you, I should hardly have
ventured to stray so far."

"I need hardly say how much obliged we are. But we will submit one or two
other cases to you."

"I am inclined to think the court would not allow them to her as
paraphernalia, seeing that their value is excessive as compared with her
income and degree; but if it did, it would do so in a fashion that would
guard them from alienation."

"She would sell them--under the rose."

"Then she would be guilty of stealing them, which she would hardly
attempt, even if not restrained by honesty, knowing, as she would know,
that the greatness of the value would almost assuredly lead to detection.
The same feeling would prevent buyers from purchasing."

"She says, you know, that they were given to her, absolutely."

"I should like to know the circumstances."

"Yes; of course."

"But I should be disposed to think that in equity no allegation by the
receiver of such a gift, unsubstantiated either by evidence or by deed,
would be allowed to stand. The gentleman left behind him a will, and
regular settlements. I should think that the possession of these diamonds
--not, I presume, touched on in the settlements---"

"Oh dear no; not a word about them."

"I should think, then, that, subject to any claim to paraphernalia, the
possession of the diamonds would be ruled by the will." Mr. Camperdown was
rushing into the further difficulty of chattels in Scotland and those in
England, when the Turtle Dove stopped him, declaring that he could not
venture to discuss matters as to which he knew none of the facts.

"Of course not; of course not," said Mr. Camperdown. "We'll have cases
prepared. I'd apologise for coming at all, only that I get so much from a
few words."

"I'm always delighted to see you, Mr. Camperdown," said the Turtle Dove,
bowing.




CHAPTER XXIX

I HAD BETTER GO AWAY


When Lord Fawn gave a sudden jump and stalked away towards the house on
that Sunday morning before breakfast, Lucy Morris was a very unhappy girl.
She had a second time accused Lord Fawn of speaking an untruth. She did
not quite understand the usages of the world in the matter; but she did
know that the one offence which a gentleman is supposed never to commit is
that of speaking an untruth. The offence may be one committed oftener than
any other by gentlemen--as also by all other people; but, nevertheless, it
is regarded by the usages of society as being the one thing which a
gentleman never does. Of all this Lucy understood something. The word
"lie" she knew to be utterly abominable. That Lizzie Eustace was a little
liar had been acknowledged between herself and the Fawn girls very often;
but to have told Lady Eustace that any word spoken by her was a lie would
have been a worse crime than the lie itself. To have brought such an
accusation, in that form, against Lord Fawn, would have been to degrade
herself forever. Was there any difference between a lie and an untruth?
That one must be, and that the other need not be, intentional, she did
feel; but she felt also that the less offensive word had come to mean a
lie--the world having been driven so to use it because the world did not
dare to talk about lies; and this word, bearing such a meaning in common
parlance, she had twice applied to Lord Fawn. And yet, as she was well
aware, Lord Fawn had told no lie. He had himself believed every word that
he had spoken against Frank Greystock. That he had been guilty of unmanly
cruelty in so speaking of her lover in her presence Lucy still thought,
but she should not therefore have accused him of falsehood. "It was untrue
all the same," she said to herself, as she stood still on the gravel walk,
watching the rapid disappearance of Lord Fawn, and endeavouring to think
what she had better now do with herself. Of course Lord Fawn, like a great
child, would at once go and tell his mother what that wicked governess had
said to him.

In the hall she met her friend Lydia. "Oh, Lucy, what is the matter with
Frederic?" she asked.

"Lord Fawn is very angry indeed."

"With you?"

"Yes; with me. He is so angry that I am sure he would not sit down to
breakfast with me. So I won't come down. Will you tell your mamma? If she
likes to send to me, of course I'll go to her at once."

"What have you done, Lucy?"

"I've told him again that what he said wasn't true."

"But why?"

"Because--oh, how can I say why? Why does any person do everything that
she ought not to do? It's the fall of Adam, I suppose."

"You shouldn't make a joke of it, Lucy."

"You can have no conception how unhappy I am about it. Of course Lady Fawn
will tell me to go away. I went out on purpose to beg his pardon for what
I said last night, and I just said the very same thing again."

"But why did you say it?"

"And I should say it again and again and again, if he were to go on
telling me that Mr. Greystock isn't a gentleman. I don't think he ought to
have done it. Of course I have been very wrong; I know that. But I think
he has been wrong too. But I must own it and he needn't. I'll go up now
and stay in my own room till your mamma sends for me."

"And I'll get Jane to bring you some breakfast."

"I don't care a bit about breakfast," said Lucy.

Lord Fawn did tell his mother, and Lady Fawn was perplexed in the extreme.
She was divided in her judgment and feelings between the privilege due to
Lucy as a girl possessed of an authorised lover--a privilege which no
doubt existed, but which was not extensive--and the very much greater
privilege which attached to Lord Fawn as a man, as a peer, as an Under-
Secretary of State, but which attached to him especially as the head and
only man belonging to the Fawn family. Such a one, when, moved by filial
duty, he condescends to come once a week to his mother's house, is
entitled to say whatever he pleases, and should on no account be
contradicted by any one. Lucy no doubt had a lover, an authorised lover;
but perhaps that fact could not be taken as more than a balancing weight
against the inferiority of her position as a governess. Lady Fawn was of
course obliged to take her son's part and would scold Lucy. Lucy must be
scolded very seriously. But it would be a thing so desirable if Lucy could
be induced to accept her scolding and have done with it, and not to make
matters worse by talking of going away! "You don't mean that she came out
into the shrubbery, having made up her mind to be rude to you?" said Lady
Fawn to her son.

"No; I do not think that. But her temper is so ungovernable, and she has,
if I may say so, been so spoiled among you here--I mean by the girls, of
course--that she does not know how to restrain herself."

"She is as good as gold, you know, Frederic." He shrugged his shoulders
and declared that he had not a word more to say about it. He could of
course remain in London till it should suit Mr. Greystock to take his
bride. "You'll break my heart if you say that," exclaimed the unhappy
mother. "Of course she shall leave the house if you wish it."

"I wish nothing," said Lord Fawn. "But I peculiarly object to be told that
I am a--liar." Then he stalked away along the corridor and went down to
breakfast as black as a thundercloud.

 Lady Fawn and Lucy sat opposite to each other in church, but ihey did not
speak till the afternoon. Lady Fawn went to church in the carriage and
Lucy walked, and as Lucy retired to her room immediately on her return to
the house, there had not been an opportunity even for a word. After lunch
Amelia came up to her and sat down for a long discussion. "Now, Lucy,
something must be done, you know," said Amelia.

"I suppose so."

"Of course mamma must see you. She can't allow things to go on in this
way. Mamma is very unhappy, and didn't eat a morsel of breakfast." By this
latter assertion Amelia simply intended to imply that her mother had
refused to be helped a second time to fried bacon, as was customary.

"Of course I shall go to her the moment she sends for me. Oh, I am so
unhappy!"

"I don't wonder at that, Lucy. So is my brother unhappy. These things make
people unhappy. It is what the world calls temper, you know, Lucy."

"Why did he tell me that Mr. Greystock isn't a gentleman? Mr. Greystock is
a gentleman. I meant to say nothing more than that."

"But you did say more, Lucy."

"When he said that Mr. Greystock wasn't a gentleman I told him it wasn't
true. Why did he say it? He knows all about it. Everybody knows. Would you
think it wise to come and abuse him to me when you know what he is to me?
I can't bear it, and I won't. I'll go away to-morrow if your mamma wishes
it." But that going away was just what Lady Fawn did not wish.

"I think you know, Lucy, you should express your deep sorrow at what has
passed."

"To your brother?"

"Yes."

"Then he would abuse Mr. Greystock again, and it would all be as bad as
ever. I'll beg Lord Fawn's pardon if he'll promise beforehand not to say a
word about Mr. Greystock."

"You can't expect him to make a bargain like that, Lucy."

"I suppose not. I dare say I'm very wicked, and I must be left wicked.
I'm too wicked to stay here. That's the long and the short of it."

"I'm afraid you're proud, Lucy."

"I suppose I am. If it wasn't for all that I owe to everybody here, and
that I love you all so much, I should be proud of being proud, because of
Mr. Greystock. Only it kills me to make Lady Fawn unhappy."

Amelia left the culprit, feeling that no good had been done, and Lady Fawn
did not see the delinquent till late in the afternoon. Lord Fawn had in
the mean time wandered out along the river all alone to brood over the
condition of his affairs. It had been an evil day for him in which he had
first seen Lady Eustace. From the first moment of his engagement to her he
had been an unhappy man. Her treatment of him, the stories which reached
his ears from Mrs. Hittaway and others, Mr. Camperdown's threats of law in
regard to the diamonds, and Frank Greystock's insults, altogether made him
aware that he could not possibly marry Lady Eustace. But yet he had no
proper and becoming way of escaping from the bonds of his engagement. He
was a man with a conscience, and was made miserable by the idea of
behaving badly to a woman. Perhaps it might have been difficult to analyse
his misery and to decide how much arose from the feeling that he was
behaving badly, and how much from the conviction that the world would
accuse him of doing so; but between the two he was wretched enough. The
punishment of the offence had been commenced by Greystock's unavenged
insults, and it now seemed to him that this girl's conduct was a
continuation of it. The world was already beginning to treat him with that
want of respect which he so greatly dreaded. He knew that he was too weak
to stand up against a widely-spread expression of opinion that he had
behaved badly. There are men who can walk about the streets with composed
countenances, take their seats in Parliament if they happened to have
seats, work in their offices or their chambers or their counting-houses
with diligence, and go about the world serenely, even though everybody be
saying evil of them behind their backs. Such men can live down temporary
calumny, and almost take a delight in the isolation which it will produce.
Lord Fawn knew well that he was not such a man. He would have described
his own weakness as caused, perhaps, by a too thin-skinned sensitiveness.
Those who knew him were inclined to say that he lacked strength of
character, and perhaps courage.

He had certainly engaged himself to marry this widow, and he was most
desirous to do what was right. He had said that he would not marry her
unless she would give up the necklace, and he was most desirous to be true
to his word. He had been twice insulted, and he was anxious to support
these injuries with dignity. Poor Lucy's little offence against him
rankled in his mind with the other great offences. That this humble friend
of his mother's should have been so insolent was a terrible thing to him.
He was not sure even whether his own sisters did not treat him with
scantier reverence than of yore. And yet he was so anxious to do right,
and do his duty in that state of life to which it had pleased God to call
him! As to much he was in doubt; but of two things he was quite sure--that
Frank Greystock was a scoundrel, and that Lucy Morris was the most
impertinent young woman in England.

"What would you wish to have done, Frederic?" his mother said to him on
his return.

"In what respect, mother?"

"About Lucy Morris? I have not seen her yet. I have thought it better that
she should be left to herself for a while before I did so. I suppose she
must come down to dinner. She always does."

"I do not wish to interfere with the young lady's meals."

"No; but about meeting her? If there is to be no talking, it will be so
very unpleasant. It will be unpleasant to us all, but I am thinking
chiefly of you."

"I do not wish anybody to be disturbed for my comfort." A young woman
coming down to dinner as though in disgrace, and not being spoken to by
any one, would in truth have had rather a soothing effect upon Lord Fawn,
who would have felt that the general silence and dullness had been
produced as a sacrifice in his honour.

"I can, of course, insist that she should apologise; but if she refuses,
what shall I do then?"

"Let there be no more apologies, if you please, mother."

"What shall I do then, Frederic?"

"Miss Morris's idea of an apology is a repetition of her offence with
increased rudeness. It is not for me to say what you should do. If it be
true that she is engaged to that man----"

"It is true, certainly."

"No doubt that will make her quite independent of you, and I can
understand that her presence here in such circumstances must be very
uncomfortable to you all. No doubt she feels her power."

"Indeed, Frederic, you do not know her."

"I can hardly say that I desire to know her better. You cannot suppose
that I can be anxious for further intimacy with a young lady who has twice
given me the lie in your house. Such conduct is, at least, very unusual;
and as no absolute punishment can be inflicted, the offender can only be
avoided. It is thus, and thus only, that such offences can be punished. I
shall be satisfied if you will give her to understand that I should prefer
that she should not address me again."

Poor Lady Fawn was beginning to think that Lucy was right in saying that
there was no remedy for all these evils but that she should go away. But
whither was she to go? She had no home but such home as she could earn for
herself by her services as a governess, and in her present position it was
almost out of the question that she should seek another place. Lady Fawn,
too, felt that she had pledged herself to Mr. Greystock that till next
year Lucy should have a home at Fawn Court. Mr. Greystock, indeed, was now
an enemy to the family; but Lucy was not an enemy, and it was out of the
question that she should be treated with real enmity. She might be
scolded, and scowled at, and put into a kind of drawing-room Coventry for
a time, so that all kindly intercourse with her should be confined to
schoolroom work and bedroom conferences. She could be generally "sat
upon," as Nina would call it. But as for quarrelling with her, making a
real enemy of one whom they all loved, one whom Lady Fawn knew to be "as
good as gold," one who had become so dear to the old lady that actual
extrusion from their family affections would be like the cutting off of a
limb, that was simply impossible. "I suppose I had better go and see her,"
said Lady Fawn, "and I have got such a headache!"

"Do not see her on my account," said Lord Fawn. The duty, however, was
obligatory, and Lady Fawn with slow steps sought Lucy in the schoolroom.

"Lucy," she said, seating herself, "what is to be the end of all this?"

Lucy came up to her and knelt at her feet. "If you knew how unhappy I am
because I have vexed you."

"I am unhappy, my dear, because I think you have been betrayed by warm
temper into misbehaviour."

"I know I have."

"Then why do you not control your temper?"

"If anybody were to come to you, Lady Fawn, and make horrible accusations
against Lord Fawn or against Augusta, would not you be angry? Would you be
able to stand it?"

Lady Fawn was not clear-headed; she was not clever; nor was she even
always rational. But she was essentially honest. She knew that she would
fly at anybody who should in her presence say such bitter things of any of
her children as Lord Fawn had said of Mr. Greystock in Lucy's hearing; and
she knew also that Lucy was entitled to hold Mr. Greystock as dearly as
she held her own son and daughters. Lord Fawn, at Fawn Court, could not do
wrong. That was a tenet by which she was obliged to hold fast. And yet
Lucy had been subjected to great cruelty. She thought awhile for a valid
argument. "My dear," she said, "your youth should make a difference."

"Of course it should."

"Though to me and to the girls you are as dear as any friend can be, and
may say just what you please. Indeed, we all live here in such a way that
we all do say just what we please, young and old together. But you ought
to know that Lord Fawn is different."

"Ought he to say that Mr. Greystock is not a gentleman to me?"

"We are, of course, very sorry that there should be any quarrel. It is all
the fault of that--nasty, false young woman."

"So it is, Lady Fawn. Lady Fawn, I have been thinking about it all the
day, and I am quite sure that I had better not stay here while you and the
girls think badly of Mr. Greystock. It is not only about Lord Fawn, but
because of the whole thing. I am always wanting to say something good
about Mr. Greystock, and you are always thinking something bad about him.
You have been to me, oh, the very best friend that a girl ever had. Why
you should have treated me so generously I never could know."

"Because we have loved you."

"But when a girl has got a man whom she loves, and has promised to marry,
he must be her best friend of all. Is it not so, Lady Fawn?" The old woman
stooped down and kissed the girl who had got the man. "It is not
ingratitude to you that makes me think most of him; is it?"

"Certainly not, dear."

"Then I had better go away."

"But where will you go, Lucy?"

"I will consult Mr. Greystock."

"But what can he do, Lucy? It will only be a trouble to him. He can't find
a home for you."

"Perhaps they would have me at the deanery," said Lucy slowly. She had
evidently been thinking much of it all. "And, Lady Fawn, I will not go
down-stairs while Lord Fawn is here; and when he comes, if he does come
again while I am here, he shall not be troubled by seeing me. He may be
sure of that. And you may tell him that I don't defend myself, only I
shall always think that he ought not to have said that Mr. Greystock
wasn't a gentleman before me." When Lady Fawn left Lucy the matter was so
far settled that Lucy had neither been asked to come down to dinner, nor
had she been forbidden to seek another home.




CHAPTER XXX

MR. GREYSTOCK'S TROUBLES


Frank Greystock stayed the Sunday in London and went down to Bobsborough
on the Monday. His father and mother and sister all knew of his engagement
to Lucy, and they had heard also that Lady Eustace was to become Lady
Fawn. Of the necklace they had hitherto heard very little, and of the
quarrel between the two lovers they had heard nothing. There had been many
misgivings at the deanery, and some regrets, about these marriages. Mrs.
Greystock, Frank's mother, was, as we are so wont to say of many women,
the best woman in the world. She was unselfish, affectionate, charitable,
and thoroughly feminine. But she did think that her son Frank, with all
his advantages, good looks, cleverness, general popularity, and seat in
Parliament, might just as well marry an heiress as a little girl without
twopence in the world. As for herself, who had been born a Jackson, she
could do with very little; but the Greystocks were all people who wanted
money. For them there was never more than ninepence in a shilling, if so
much. They were a race who could not pay their way with moderate incomes.
Even the dear dean, who really had a conscience about money, and who
hardly ever left Bobsborough, could not be kept quite clear of debt, let
her do what she would. As for the admiral, the dean's elder brother, he
had been notorious for insolvency; and Frank was a Greystock all over. He
was the very man to whom money with a wife was almost a necessity of
existence.

And his pretty cousin, the widow, who was devoted to him, and would have
married him at a word, had ever so many thousands a year! Of course Lizzie
Eustace was not just all that she should be; but then who is? In one
respect, at any rate, her conduct had always been proper. There was no
rumour against her as to lovers or flirtations. She was very young, and
Frank might have moulded her as he pleased. Of course there were regrets.
Poor dear little Lucy Morris was as good as gold. Mrs. Greystock was quite
willing to admit that. She was not good-looking; so at least Mrs.
Greystock said. She never would allow that Lucy was good-looking. And she
didn't see much in Lucy, who, according to her idea, was a little chit of
a thing. Her position was simply that of a governess. Mrs. Greystock
declared to her daughter that no one in the whole world had a higher
respect for governesses than had she. But a governess is a governess; and
for a man in Frank's position such a marriage would be simply suicide.

"You shouldn't say that, mamma, now; for it's fixed," said Ellinor
Greystock.

"But I do say it, my dear. Things sometimes are fixed which must be
unfixed. You know your brother."

"Frank is earning a large income, mamma."

"Did you ever know a Greystock who didn't want more than his income?"

"I hope I don't, mamma, and mine is very small."

"You're a Jackson. Frank is Greystock to the very backbone. If he marries
Lucy Morris he must give up Parliament. That's all."

The dean himself was more reticent and less given to interference than his
wife; but he felt it also. He would not for the world have hinted to his
son that it might be well to marry money; but he thought that it was a
good thing that his son should go where money was. He knew that Frank was
apt to spend his guineas faster than he got them. All his life long the
dean had seen what came of such spending. Frank had gone out into the
world and had prospered, but he could hardly continue to prosper unless he
married money. Of course there had been regrets when the news came of that
fatal engagement with Lucy Morris. "It can't be for the next ten years, at
any rate," said Mrs. Greystock.

"I thought at one time that he would have made a match with his cousin,"
said the dean.

"Of course; so did everybody," replied Mrs. Dean.

Then Frank came among them. He had intended staying some weeks, perhaps
for a month, and great preparations were made for him; but immediately on
his arrival he announced the necessity that was incumbent on him of going
down again to Scotland in ten days. "You've heard about Lizzie, of
course," he said. They had heard that Lizzie was to become Lady Fawn, but
beyond that they had heard nothing. "You know about the necklace?" asked
Frank. Something of a tale of a necklace had made its way even down to
quiet Bobsborough. They had been informed that there was a dispute between
the widow and the executors of the late Sir Florian about some diamonds.
"Lord Fawn is behaving about it in the most atrocious manner," continued
Frank, "and the long and the short of it is that there will be no
marriage!"

"No marriage!" exclaimed Mrs. Greystock.

"And what is the truth about the diamonds?" asked the dean.

"Ah; it will give the lawyers a job before they decide that. They're very
valuable; worth about ten thousand pounds, I'm told; but the most of it
will go among some of my friends at the Chancery bar. It's a pity that I
should be out of the scramble myself."

"But why should you be out?" asked his mother with tender regrets, not
thinking of the matter as her son was thinking of it, but feeling that
when there was so much wealth so very near him, he ought not to let it all
go past him.

"As far as I can see," continued Frank, "she has a fair claim to them. I
suppose they'll file a bill in Chancery, and then it will be out of my
line altogether. She says her husband gave them to her, absolutely put
them on her neck himself, and told her that they were hers. As to their
being an heirloom, that turns out to be impossible. I didn't know it, but
it seems you can't make diamonds an heirloom. What astonishes me is, that
Fawn should object to the necklace. However, he has objected, and has
simply told her that he won't marry her unless she gives them up."

"And what does she say?"

"Storms and raves, as of course any woman would. I don't think she is
behaving badly. What she wants is, to reduce him to obedience, and then to
dismiss him. I think that is no more than fair. Nothing on earth would
make her marry him now."

"Did she ever care for him?"

"I don't think she ever did. She found her position to be troublesome, and
she thought she had better marry. And then he's a lord, which always goes
for something."

"I am sorry you should have so much trouble," said Mrs. Greystock. But in
truth the mother was not sorry. She did not declare to herself that it
would be a good thing that her son should be false to Lucy Morris in order
that he might marry his rich cousin; but she did feel it to be an
advantage that he should be on terms of intimacy with so large an income
as that belonging to Lady Eustace. "Doan't thou marry for munny, but goa
where munny is." Mrs. Greystock would have repudiated the idea of
mercenary marriages in any ordinary conversation, and would have been
severe on any gentleman who was false to a young lady. But it is so hard
to bring one's general principles to bear on one's own conduct or in one's
own family; and then the Greystocks were so peculiar a people! When her
son told her that he must go down to Scotland again very shortly, she
reconciled herself to his loss. Had he left Bobsborough for the sake of
being near Lucy at Richmond, she would have felt it very keenly.

Days passed by, and nothing was said about poor Lucy. Mrs. Greystock had
made up her mind that she would say nothing on the subject. Lucy had
behaved badly in allowing herself to be loved by a man who ought to have
loved money, and Mrs. Greystock had resolved that she would show her
feelings by silence. The dean had formed no fixed determination, but he
had thought that it might be, perhaps, as well to drop the subject. Frank
himself was unhappy about it; but from morning to evening, and from day to
day, he allowed it to pass by without a word. He knew that it should not
be so, that silence was in truth treachery to Lucy; but he was silent.
What had he meant when, as he left Lizzie Eustace among the rocks at
Portray, in that last moment, he had assured her that he would be true to
her? And what had been Lizzie's meaning? He was more sure of Lizzie's
meaning than he was of his own. "It's a very rough world to live in," he
said to himself in these days, as he thought of his difficulties.

But when he had been nearly a week at the deanery, and when the day of his
going was so near as to be a matter of concern, his sister did at last
venture to say a word about Lucy. "I suppose there is nothing settled
about your own marriage, Frank?"

"Nothing at all."

"Nor will be for some while?"

"Nor will be for some while." This he said in a tone which he himself felt
to be ill-humoured and almost petulant. And he felt also that such ill-
humour on such a subject was unkind, not to his sister, but to Lucy. It
seemed to imply that the matter of his marriage was distasteful to him.
"The truth is," he said, "that nothing can be fixed. Lucy understands that
as well as I do. I am not in a position at once to marry a girl who has
nothing. It's a pity, perhaps, that one can't train one's self to like
some girl best that has got money; but as I haven't, there must be some
delay. She is to stay where she is, at any rate for a twelvemonth."

"But you mean to see her?"

"Well, yes; I hardly know how I can see her, as I have quarrelled to the
knife with Lord Fawn; and Lord Fawn is recognised by his mother and sister
as the one living Jupiter upon earth."

"I like them for that," said Ellinor.

"Only it prevents my going to Richmond; and poor Fawn himself is such an
indifferent Jupiter."

That was all that was said about Lucy at Bobsborough, till there came a
letter from Lucy to her lover acquainting him with the circumstances of
her unfortunate position at Richmond. She did not tell him quite all the
circumstances. She did not repeat the strong expressions which Lord Fawn
had used, nor did she clearly explain how wrathful she had been herself.
"Lord Fawn has been here," she said, "and there has been ever so much
unpleasantness. He is very angry with you about Lady Eustace, and of
course Lady Fawn takes his part. I need not tell you whose part I take.
And so there have been what the servants call 'just a few words.' It is
very dreadful, isn't it? And, after all, Lady Fawn has been as kind as
possible. But the upshot of it is that I am not to stay here. You mustn't
suppose that I'm to be turned out at twelve hours' notice. I am to stay
till arrangements have been made, and everybody will be kind to me. But
what had I better do? I'll try and get another situation at once if you
think it best, only I suppose I should have to explain how long I could
stay. Lady Fawn knows that I am writing to you to ask you what you think
best."

On receipt of this Greystock was very much puzzled. What a little fool
Lucy had been, and yet what a dear little fool! Who cared for Lord Fawn
and his hard words? Of course Lord Fawn would say all manner of evil
things of him, and would crow valiantly in his own farmyard; but it would
have been so much wiser on Lucy's part to have put up with the crowing,
and to have disregarded altogether the words of a man so weak and
insignificant! But the evil was done, and he must make some arrangement
for poor Lucy's comfort. Had he known exactly how matters stood, that the
proposition as to Lucy's departure had come wholly from herself, and that
at the present time all the ladies at Fawn Court--of course in the absence
of Lord Fawn--were quite disposed to forgive Lucy if Lucy would only be
forgiven, and hide herself when Lord Fawn should come; had Frank known all
this, he might, perhaps, have counselled her to remain at Richmond. But he
believed that Lady Fawn had insisted on Lucy's departure; and of course,
in such a case, Lucy must depart. He showed the letter to his sister, and
asked for advice.

"How very unfortunate!" said Ellinor.

"Yes; is it not?"

"I wonder what she said to Lord Fawn?"

"She would speak out very plainly."

"I suppose she has spoken out plainly, or otherwise they would never have
told her to go away. It seems so unlike what I have always heard of Lady
Fawn."

"Lucy can be very headstrong if she pleases," said Lucy's lover. "What on
earth had I better do for her? I don't suppose she can get another place
that would suit."

"If she is to be your wife I don't think she should go into another place.
If it is quite fixed," she said, and then she looked into her brother's
face.

"Well; what then?"

"If you are sure you mean it----"

"Of course I mean it."

"Then she had better come here. As for her going out as a governess, and
telling the people that she is to be your wife in a few months, that is
out of the question. And it would, I think, be equally so that she should
go into any house and not tell the truth. Of course this would be the
place for her." It was at last decided that Ellinor should discuss the
matter with her mother.

When the whole matter was unfolded to Mrs. Greystock that lady was more
troubled than ever. If Lucy were to come to the deanery, she must come as
Frank's affianced bride, and must be treated as such by all Bobsborough.
The dean would be giving his express sanction to the marriage, and so
would Mrs. Greystock herself. She knew well that she had no power of
refusing her sanction. Frank must do as he pleased about marrying. Were
Lucy once his wife, of course she would be made welcome to the best the
deanery could give her. There was no doubt about Lucy being as good as
gold; only that real gold, vile as it is, was the one thing that Frank so
much needed. The mother thought that she had discovered in her son
something which seemed to indicate a possibility that this very imprudent
match might at last be abandoned; and if there were such possibility,
surely Lucy ought not now to be brought to the deanery. Nevertheless, if
Frank were to insist upon her coming, she must come.

But Mrs. Greystock had a plan. "Oh, mamma," said Ellinor, when the plan
was proposed to her, "do not you think that would be cruel?"

"Cruel, my dear! no; certainly not cruel."

"She is such a virago."

"You think that because Lizzie Eustace has said so. I don't know that
she's a virago at all. I believe her to be a very good sort of woman."

"Do you remember, mamma, what the admiral used to say of her?"

"The admiral, my dear, tried to borrow her money, as he did everybody's,
and when she wouldn't give him any, then he said severe things. The poor
admiral was never to be trusted in such matters."

"I don't think Frank would like it," said Ellinor. The plan was this. Lady
Linlithgow, who, through her brother-in-law, the late Admiral Greystock,
was connected with the dean's family, had made known her desire to have a
new companion for six months. The lady was to be treated like a lady, but
was to have no salary. Her travelling expenses were to be paid for her and
no duties were to be expected from her, except that of talking and
listening to the countess.

"I really think it's the very thing for her," said Mrs. Greystock. "It's
not like being a governess. She's not to have any salary."

"I don't know whether that makes it better, mamma."

"It would just be a visit to Lady Linlithgow. It is that which makes the
difference, my dear."

Ellinor felt sure that her brother would not hear of such an engagement,
but he did hear of it, and, after various objections, gave a sort of
sanction to it. It was not to be pressed upon Lucy if Lucy disliked it.
Lady Linlithgow was to be made to understand that Lucy might leave
whenever she pleased. It was to be an invitation, which Lucy might accept
if she were so minded. Lucy's position as an honourable guest was to be
assured to her. It was thought better that Lady Linlithgow should not be
told of Lucy's engagement unless she asked questions, or unless Lucy
should choose to tell her. Every precaution was to be taken, and then
Frank gave his sanction. He could understand, he said, that it might be
inexpedient that Lucy should come at once to the deanery, as, were she to
do so, she must remain there till her marriage, let the time be ever so
long. "It might be two years," said the mother.

"Hardly so long as that," said the son.

"I don't think it would be--quite fair--to papa," said the mother. It was
well that the argument was used behind the dean's back, as, had it been
made in his hearing, the dean would have upset it at once. The dean was so
short-sighted and imprudent that he would have professed delight at the
idea of having Lucy Morris as a resident at the deanery. Frank acceded to
the argument, and was ashamed of himself for acceding. Ellinor did not
accede, nor did her sisters, but it was necessary that they should yield.
Mrs. Greystock at once wrote to Lady Linlithgow, and Frank wrote by the
same post to Lucy Morris.

"As there must be a year's delay," he wrote, "we all here think it best
that your visit to us should be postponed for a while. But if you object
to the Linlithgow plan, say so at once. You shall be asked to do nothing
disagreeable." He found the letter very difficult to write. He knew that
she ought to have been welcomed at once to Bobsborough. And he knew, too,
the reason on which his mother's objection was founded. But it might be
two years before he could possibly marry Lucy Morris, or it might be
three. Would it be proper that she should be desired to make the deanery
her home for so long and so indefinite a time? And when an engagement was
for so long, could it be well that everybody should know it, as everybody
would if Lucy were to take up her residence permanently at the deanery?
Some consideration, certainly, was due to his father.

And, moreover, it was absolutely necessary that he and Lizzie Eustace
should understand each other as to that mutual pledge of truth which had
passed between them.

In the meantime he received the following letter from Messrs. Camperdown:

"62 NEW SQUARE, LINCOLN'S INN, September 15, 18--.

"DEAR SIR,--After what passed in our chambers the other day, we think it
best to let you know that we have been instructed by the executor of the
late Sir Florian Eustace to file a bill in Chancery against the widow,
Lady Eustace, for the recovery of valuable diamonds. You will oblige us by
making the necessary communication to her ladyship, and will perhaps tell
us the names of her ladyship's solicitors.

"We are, dear sir,

"Your very obedient servants,

"CAMPERDOWN & SON.

"F. GREYSTOCK, ESQ., M.P."

A few days after the receipt of this letter Frank started for Scotland.




CHAPTER XXXI

FRANK GREYSTOCK'S SECOND VISIT TO PORTRAY


On this occasion Frank Greystock went down to Portray Castle with the
intention of staying at the house during the very short time that he would
remain in Scotland. He was going there solely on his cousin's business,
with no view to grouse-shooting or other pleasure, and he purposed
remaining but a very short time--perhaps only one night. His cousin,
moreover, had spoken of having guests with her, in which case there could
be no tinge of impropriety in his doing so. And whether she had guests, or
whether she had not, what difference could it really make? Mr. Andrew
Gowran had already seen what there was to see, and could do all the evil
that could be done. He could, if he were so minded, spread reports in the
neighbourhood, and might, perhaps, have the power of communicating what he
had discovered to the Eustace faction, John Eustace, Mr. Camperdown, and
Lord Fawn. That evil, if it were an evil, must be encountered with
absolute indifference. So he went direct to the castle, and was received
quietly, but very graciously, by his cousin Lizzie.

There were no guests then staying at Portray; but that very distinguished
lady, Mrs. Carbuncle, with her niece, Miss Roanoke, had been there; as had
also that very well-known nobleman, Lord George de Bruce Carruthers. Lord
George and Mrs. Carbuncle were in the habit of seeing a good deal of each
other, though, as all the world knew, there was nothing between them but
the simplest friendship. And Sir Griffin Tewett had also been there, a
young baronet who was supposed to be enamoured of that most gorgeous of
beauties, Lucinda Roanoke. Of all these grand friends--friends with whom
Lizzie had become acquainted in London--nothing further need be said here,
as they were not at the castle when Frank arrived. When he came, whether
by premeditated plan or by the chance of circumstances, Lizzie had no one
with her at Portray except the faithful Macnulty.

"I thought to have found you with all the world here," said Frank, the
faithful Macnulty being then present.

"Well, we have had people, but only for a couple of days. They are all
coming again, but not till November. You hunt, don't you, Frank?"

"I have no time for hunting. Why do you ask?"

"I'm going to hunt. It's a long way to go--ten or twelve miles generally;
but almost everybody hunts here. Mrs. Carbuncle is coming again, and she
is about the best lady in England after hounds; so they tell me. And Lord
George is coming again."

"Who is Lord George?"

"You remember Lord George Carruthers, whom we all knew in London?"

"What, the tall man with the hollow eyes and the big whiskers, whose life
is a mystery to every one? Is he coming?"

"I like him just because he isn't a ditto to every man one meets. And Sir
Griffin Tewett is coming."

"Who is a ditto to everybody."

"Well, yes; poor Sir Griffin! The truth is, he is awfully smitten with
Mrs. Carbuncle's niece."

"Don't you go match-making, Lizzie," said Frank. "That Sir Griffin is a
fool, we will all allow; but it's my belief he has wit enough to make
himself pass off as a man of fortune, with very little to back it. He's at
law with his mother, at law with his sisters, and at law with his younger
brother."

"If he were at law with his great-grandmother, it would be nothing to me,
Frank. She has her aunt to take care of her, and Sir Griffin is coming
with Lord George."

"You don't mean to put up all their horses, Lizzie?"

"Well, not all. Lord George and Sir Griffin are to keep theirs at Troon,
or Kilmarnock, or somewhere. The ladies will bring two apiece, and I shall
have two of my own."

"And carriage horses and hacks?"

"The carriage horses are here, of course."

"It will cost you a great deal of money, Lizzie."

"That's just what I tell her," said Miss Macnulty.

"I've been living here, not spending one shilling, for the last two
months," said Lizzie, "and all for the sake of economy; yet people think
that no woman was ever left so rich. Surely I can afford to see a few
friends for one month in the year. If I can't afford so much as that, I
shall let the place and go and live abroad somewhere. It's too much to
suppose that a woman should shut herself up here for six or eight months
and see nobody all the time."

On that, the day of Frank's arrival, not a word was said about the
necklace, nor of Lord Fawn, nor of that mutual pledge which had been taken
and given, down among the rocks. Frank, before dinner, went out about the
place that he might see how things were going on, and observe whether the
widow was being ill-treated and unfairly eaten up by her dependents. He
was, too, a little curious as to a matter as to which his curiosity was
soon relieved. He had hardly reached the outbuildings which lay behind the
kitchen gardens on his way to the Portray woods, before he encountered
Andy Gowran. That faithful adherent of the family raised his hand to his
cap and bobbed his head, and then silently, and with renewed diligence,
applied himself to the job which he had in hand. The gate of the little
yard in which the cow-shed stood was off its hinges, and Andy was
resetting the post and making the fence tight and tidy. Frank stood a
moment watching him, and then asked after his health. "'Deed am I nae that
to boost about in the way of bodily heelth, Muster Greystock. I've just
o'er mony things to tent to, to tent to my ain sell as a prudent mon
ought. It's airly an' late wi' me, Muster Greystock; and the lumbagy just
a' o'er a mon isn't the pleasantest freend in the warld." Frank said that
he was sorry to hear so bad an account of Mr. Gowran's health, and passed
on. It was not for him to refer to the little scene in which Mr. Gowran
had behaved so badly and had shaken his head. If the misbehaviour had been
condoned by Lady Eustace, the less that he said about it, the better. Then
he went on through the woods, and was well aware that Mr. Gowran's
fostering care had not been abated by his disapproval of his mistress. The
fences had been repaired since Frank was there, and stones had been laid
on the road or track over which was to be carried away the underwood which
it would be Lady Eustace's privilege to cut during the coming winter.

Frank was not alone for one moment with his cousin during that evening,
but in the presence of Miss Macnulty all the circumstances of the necklace
were discussed. "Of course it is my own," said Lady Eustace, standing up,
"my own to do just what I please with. If they go on like this with me,
they will almost tempt me to sell it for what it will fetch, just to prove
to them that I can do so. I have half a mind to sell it and then send them
the money and tell them to put it by for my little Flory. Would not that
serve them right, Frank?"

"I don't think I'd do that, Lizzie."

"Why not? You always tell me what not to do, but you never say what I
ought!"

"That is because I am so wise and prudent. If you were to attempt to sell
the diamonds they would stop you, and would not give you credit for the
generous purpose afterward."

"They wouldn't stop you if you sold the ring you wear." The ring had been
given to him by Lucy after their engagement, and was the only present she
had ever made him. It had been purchased out of her own earnings, and had
been put on his finger by her own hand. Either from accident or craft he
had not worn it when he had been before at Portray, and Lizzie had at once
observed it as a thing she had never seen before. She knew well that he
would not buy such a ring. Who had given him the ring? Frank almost
blushed as he looked down at the trinket, and Lizzie was sure that it had
been given by that sly little creeping thing, Lucy. "Let me look at the
ring," she said. "Nobody could stop you if you chose to sell this to me."

"Little things are always less troublesome than big things," he said.

"What is the price?" she asked.

"It is not in the market, Lizzie. Nor should your diamonds be there. You
must be content to let them take what legal steps they may think fit, and
defend your property. After that you can do as you please; but keep them
safe till the thing is settled. If I were you I would have them at the
bankers."

"Yes; and then when I asked for them be told that they couldn't be given
up to me because of Mr. Camperdown or the Lord Chancellor. And what's the
good of a thing locked up? You wear your ring; why shouldn't I wear my
necklace?"

"I have nothing to say against it."

"It isn't that I care for such things. Do I, Julia?"

"All ladies like them, I suppose," said that stupidest and most stubborn
of all humble friends, Miss Macnulty.

"I don't like them at all, and you know I don't. I hate them. They have
been the misery of my life. Oh, how they have tormented me! Even when I am
asleep I dream about them, and think that people steal them. They have
never given me one moment's happiness. When I have them on I am always
fearing that Camperdown & Son are behind me and are going to clutch them.
And I think too well of myself to believe that anybody will care more for
me because of a necklace. The only good they have ever done me has been to
save me from a man who I now know never cared for me. But they are mine;
and therefore I choose to keep them. Though I am only a woman, I have an
idea of my own rights, and will defend them as far as they go. If you say
I ought not to sell them, Frank, I'll keep them; but I'll wear them as
commonly as you do that _gage d'amour_ which you carry on your finger.
Nobody shall ever see me without them. I won't go to any old dowager's
tea-party without them. Mr. John Eustace has chosen to accuse me of
stealing them."

"I don't think John Eustace has ever said a word about them," said Frank.

"Mr. Camperdown, then; the people who choose to call themselves the
guardians and protectors of my boy, as if I were not his best guardian and
protector. I'll show them at any rate that I'm not ashamed of my booty. I
don't see why I should lock them up in a musty old bank. Why don't you
send your ring to the bank?"

Frank could not but feel that she did it all very well. In the first
place, she was very pretty in the display of her half-mock indignation.
Though she used some strong words, she used them with an air that carried
them off and left no impression that she had been either vulgar or
violent. And then, though the indignation was half mock, it was also half
real, and her courage and spirit were attractive. Greystock had at last
taught himself to think that Mr. Camperdown was not justified in the claim
which he made, and that in consequence of that unjust claim Lizzie Eustace
had been subjected to ill-usage. "Did you ever see this bone of
contention," she asked; "this fair Helen for which Greeks and Romans are
to fight?"

"I never saw the necklace, if you mean that."

"I'll fetch it. You ought to see it, as you have to talk about it so
often."

"Can I get it?" asked Miss Macnulty.

"Heaven and earth! To suppose that I should ever keep them under less than
seven keys, and that there should be any of the locks that anybody should
be able to open except myself!"

"And where are the seven keys?" asked Frank.

"Next to my heart," said Lizzie, putting her hand on her left side. "And
when I sleep they are always tied round my neck in a bag, and the bag
never escapes from my grasp. And I have such a knife under my pillow,
ready for Mr. Camperdown should he come to seize them!" Then she ran out
of the room, and in a couple of minutes returned with the necklace hanging
loose in her hand. It was part of her little play to show by her speed
that the close locking of the jewels was a joke, and that the ornament,
precious as it was, received at her hands no other treatment than might
any indifferent feminine bauble. Nevertheless within those two minutes she
had contrived to unlock the heavy iron case which always stood beneath the
foot of her bed. "There," she said, chucking the necklace across the table
to Frank, so that he was barely able to catch it. "There is ten thousand
pounds' worth, as they tell me. Perhaps you will not believe me when I say
that I should have the greatest satisfaction in the world in throwing them
out among those blue waves yonder, did I not think that Camperdown & Son
would fish them up again."

Frank spread the necklace on the table and stood up to look at it, while
Miss Macnulty came and gazed at the jewels over his shoulder. "And that is
worth ten thousand pounds," said he.

"So people say."

"And your husband gave it you just as another man gives a trinket that
costs ten shillings!"

"Just as Lucy Morris gave you that ring."

He smiled, but took no other notice of the accusation. "I am so poor a
man," said he, "that this string of stones, which you throw about the room
like a child's toy, would be the making of me."

"Take it and be made," said Lizzie.

"It seems an awful thing to me to have so much value in my hands," said
Miss Macnulty, who had lifted the necklace off the table. "It would buy an
estate; wouldn't it?"

"It would buy the honourable estate of matrimony if it belonged to many
women," said Lizzie, "but it hasn't had just that effect with me; has it,
Frank?"

"You haven't used it with that view yet."

"Will you have it, Frank?" she said. "Take it with all its encumbrances
and weight of cares. Take it with all the burden of Messrs. Camperdown's
law-suits upon it. You shall be as welcome to it as flowers were ever
welcomed in May."

"The encumbrances are too heavy," said Frank.

"You prefer a little ring."

"Very much."

"I don't doubt but you're right," said Lizzie. "Who fears to rise will
hardly get a fall. But there they are for you to look at, and there they
shall remain for the rest of the evening." So saying, she clasped the
string round Miss Macnulty's throat. "How do you feel, Julia, with an
estate upon your neck? Five hundred acres at a pound an acre. That's about
it." Miss Macnulty looked as though she did not like it, but she stood for
a time bearing the precious burden, while Frank explained to his cousin
that she could hardly buy land to pay her five per cent. They were then
taken off and left lying on the table till Lady Eustace took them with her
as she went to bed. "I do feel so like some naughty person in the 'Arabian
Nights,'" she said, "who has got some great treasure that always brings
him into trouble; but he can't get rid of it, because some spirit has
given it to him. At last some morning it turns to slate stones, and then
he has to be a water-carrier, and is happy ever afterwards, and marries
the king's daughter. What sort of a king's son will there be for me when
this turns into slate stones? Good night, Frank." Then she went off with
her diamonds and her bed-candle.

On the following day Frank suggested that there should be a business
conversation. "That means that I am to sit silent and obedient while you
lecture me," she said. But she submitted, and they went together into the
little sitting-room which looked out over the sea, the room where she kept
her Shelley and her Byron, and practised her music and did water-colours,
and sat, sometimes, dreaming of a Corsair. "And now, my gravest of
Mentors, what must a poor ignorant female Telemachus do, so that the world
may not trample on her too heavily?" He began by telling her what had
happened between himself and Lord Fawn, and recommended her to write to
that unhappy nobleman, returning any present that she might have received
from him, and expressing, with some mild but intelligible sarcasm, her
regret that their paths should have crossed each other. "I've worse in
store for his lordship than that," said Lizzie.

"Do you mean by any personal interview?"

"Certainly."

"I think you are wrong, Lizzie."

"Of course you do. Men have become so soft themselves, that they no longer
dare to think even of punishing those who behave badly, and they expect
women to be softer and more _fainéant_ than themselves. I have been ill-
used."

"Certainly you have."

"And I will be revenged. Look here, Frank; if your view of these things is
altogether different from mine, let us drop the subject. Of all living
human beings you are the one that is most to me now. Perhaps you are more
than any other ever was. But, even for you, I cannot alter my nature. Even
for you I would not alter it if I could. That man has injured me, and all
the world knows it. I will have my revenge, and all the world shall know
that. I did wrong; I am sensible enough of that."

"What wrong do you mean?"

"I told a man whom I never loved that I would marry him. God knows that I
have been punished."

"Perhaps, Lizzie, it is better as it is."

"A great deal better. I will tell you now that I could never have induced
myself to go into church with that man as his bride. With a man I didn't
love I might have done so, but not with a man I despised."

"You have been saved, then, from a greater evil."

"Yes; but not the less is his injury to me. It is not because he despises
me that he rejects me; nor is it because he thought that I had taken
property that was not my own."

"Why then?"

"Because he was afraid the world would say that I had done so. Poor
shallow creature! But he shall be punished."

"I do not know how you can punish him."

"Leave that to me. I have another thing to do much more difficult." She
paused, looking for a moment up into his face, and then turning her eyes
upon the ground. As he said nothing, she went on. "I have to excuse myself
to you for having accepted him."

"I have never blamed you."

"Not in words. How should you? But if you have not blamed me in your
heart, I despise you. I know you have. I have seen it in your eyes when
you have counselled me either to take the poor creature or to leave him.
Speak out, now, like a man. Is it not so?"

"I never thought you loved him."

"Loved him! Is there anything in him or about him that a woman could love?
Is he not a poor social stick; a bit of half-dead wood, good to make a
post of if one wants a post? I did want a post so sorely then!"

"I don't see why."

"No, indeed. It was natural that you should be inclined to marry again."

"Natural that I should be inclined to marry again! And is that all? It is
hard sometimes to see whether men are thick-witted, or hypocrites so
perfect that they seem to be so. I cannot bring myself to think you thick-
witted, Frank."

"Then I must be the perfect hypocrite, of course."

"You believed I accepted Lord Fawn because it was natural that I should
wish to marry again! Frank, you believed nothing of the kind. I accepted
him in my anger, in my misery, in my despair, because I had expected you
to come to me, and you had not come." She had thrown herself now into a
chair, and sat looking at him. "You had told me you would come, and you
had stayed away. It was you, Frank, that I wanted to punish then; but
there was no punishment in it for you. When is it to be, Frank?"

"When is what to be?" he asked, in a low voice, all but dumbfounded. How
was he to put an end to this conversation, and what was he to say to her?

"Your marriage with that little wizened thing who gave you the ring, that
prim morsel of feminine propriety who has been clever enough to make you
believe that her morality would suffice to make you happy."

"I will not hear Lucy Morris abused, Lizzie."

"Is that abuse? Is it abuse to say that she is moral and proper? But, sir,
I shall abuse her. I know her for what she is, while your eyes are sealed.
She is wise and moral, and decorous and prim; but she is a hypocrite, and
has no touch of real heart in her composition. Not abuse her when she has
robbed me of all, all, all that I have in the world! Go to her. You had
better go at once. I did not mean to say all this, but it has been said,
and you must leave me. I, at any rate, cannot play the hypocrite. I wish I
could." He rose and came to her, and attempted to take her hand, but she
flung away from him. "No," she said, "never again; never, unless you will
tell me that the promise you made me when we were down on the seashore was
a true promise. Was that truth, sir, or was it a--lie?"

"Lizzie, do not use such a word as that to me."

"I cannot stand picking my words when the whole world is going round with
me, and my very brain is on fire. What is it to me what my words are? Say
one syllable to me, and every word I utter again while breath is mine
shall be spoken to do you pleasure. If you cannot say it, it is nothing to
me what you or any one may think of my words. You know my secret, and I
care not who else knows it. At any rate, I can die." Then she paused a
moment, and after that stalked steadily out of the room.

That afternoon Frank took a long walk by himself over the mountains,
nearly to the cottage and back again; and on his return was informed that
Lady Eustace was ill, and had gone to bed. At any rate, she was too unwell
to come down to dinner. He, therefore, and Miss Macnulty sat down to dine,
and passed the evening together without other companionship. Frank had
resolved during his walk that he would leave Portray the next day; but had
hardly resolved upon anything else. One thing, however, seemed certain to
him. He was engaged to marry Lucy Morris, and to that engagement he must
be true. His cousin was very charming, and had never looked so lovely in
his eyes as when she had been confessing her love for him. And he had
wondered at and admired her courage, her power of language, and her force.
He could not quite forget how useful would be her income to him. And,
added to this, there was present to him an unwholesome feeling, ideas
absolutely at variance with those better ideas which had prompted him when
he was writing his offer to Lucy Morris in his chambers, that a woman such
as was his cousin Lizzie was fitter to be the wife of a man thrown, as he
must be, into the world, than a dear, quiet, domestic little girl such as
Lucy Morris. But to Lucy Morris he was engaged, and therefore there was an
end of it.

The next morning he sent his love to his cousin, asking whether he should
see her before he went. It was still necessary that he should know what
attorneys to employ on her behalf if the threatened bill were filed by
Messrs. Camperdown. Then he suggested a firm in his note. Might he put the
case into the hands of Mr. Townsend, who was a friend of his own? There
came back to him a scrap of paper, an old envelope, on which were written
the names of Mowbray & Mopus: Mowbray & Mopus in a large scrawling hand,
and with pencil. He put the scrap of paper into his pocket, feeling that
he could not remonstrate with her at this moment, and was prepared to
depart, when there came a message to him. Lady Eustace was still unwell,
but had risen; and if it were not giving him too much trouble, would see
him before he went. He followed the messenger to the same little room,
looking out upon the sea, and then found her, dressed indeed, but with a
white morning wrapper on, and with hair loose over her shoulders. Her eyes
were red with weeping, and her face was pale, and thin, and woebegone. "I
am so sorry that you are ill, Lizzie," he said.

"Yes, I am ill; sometimes very ill; but what does it matter? I did not
send for you, Frank, to speak of aught so trivial as that. I have a favour
to ask."

"Of course I will grant it."

"It is your forgiveness for my conduct yesterday."

"Oh, Lizzie!"

"Say that you forgive me. Say it!"

"How can I forgive where there has been no fault?"

"There has been fault. Say that you forgive me." And she stamped her foot
as she demanded his pardon.

"I do forgive you," he said.

"And now, one farewell." She then threw herself upon his breast and kissed
him. "Now go," she said; "go, and come no more to me, unless you would see
me mad. May God Almighty bless you, and make you happy." As she uttered
this prayer she held the door in her hand, and there was nothing for him
but to leave her.




CHAPTER XXXII

MR. AND MRS. HITTAWAY IN SCOTLAND


A great many people go to Scotland in the autumn. When you have your
autumn holiday in hand to dispose of it, there is nothing more
aristocratic that you can do than go to Scotland. Dukes are more plentiful
there than in Pall Mall, and you will meet an earl or at least a lord on
every mountain. Of course, if you merely travel about from inn to inn, and
neither have a moor of your own nor stay with any great friend, you don't
quite enjoy the cream of it; but to go to Scotland in August and stay
there, perhaps, till the end of September, is about the most certain step
you can take towards autumnal fashion. Switzerland and the Tyrol, and even
Italy, are all redolent of Mr. Cook, and in those beautiful lands you
become subject at least to suspicion.

By no person was the duty of adhering to the best side of society more
clearly appreciated than by Mr. and Mrs. Hittaway of Warwick Square. Mr.
Hittaway was Chairman of the Board of Civil Appeals, and was a man who
quite understood that there are chairmen and--chairmen. He could name to
you three or four men holding responsible permanent official positions,
quite as good as that he filled in regard to salary--which, as he often
said of his own, was a mere nothing, just a poor two thousand pounds a
year, not as much as a grocer would make in a decent business--but they
were simply head clerks and nothing more. Nobody knew anything of them.
They had no names. You did not meet them anywhere. Cabinet ministers never
heard of them; and nobody out of their own offices ever consulted them.
But there are others, and Mr. Hittaway felt greatly conscious that he was
one of them, who move altogether in a different sphere. One minister of
State would ask another whether Hittaway had been consulted on this or on
that measure--so at least the Hittawayites were in the habit of reporting.
The names of Mr. and Mrs. Hittaway were constantly in the papers. They
were invited to evening gatherings at the houses of both the alternate
Prime Ministers. They were to be seen at fashionable gatherings up the
river. They attended concerts at Buckingham Palace. Once a year they gave
a dinner-party which was inserted in the "Morning Post." On such occasions
at least one Cabinet Minister always graced the board. In fact, Mr.
Hittaway, as Chairman of the Board of Civil Appeals, was somebody; and
Mrs. Hittaway, as his wife, and as sister to a peer, was somebody also.
The reader will remember that Mrs. Hittaway had been a Fawn before she
married.

There is this drawback upon the happy condition which Mr. Hittaway had
achieved, that it demands a certain expenditure. Let nobody dream that he
can be somebody without having to pay for that honour; unless, indeed, he
be a clergyman. When you go to a concert at Buckingham Palace you pay
nothing, it is true, for your ticket; and a Cabinet Minister dining with
you does not eat or drink more than your old friend Jones the attorney.
But in some insidious, unforeseen manner, in a way that can only be
understood after much experience, these luxuries of fashion do make a
heavy pull on a modest income. Mrs. Hittaway knew this thoroughly, having
much experience, and did make her fight bravely. For Mr. Hittaway's income
was no more than modest. A few thousand pounds he had of his own when he
married, and his Clara had brought to him the unpretending sum of fifteen
hundred. But, beyond that, the poor official salary--which was less than
what a decent grocer would make--was their all. The house in Warwick
Square they had prudently purchased on their marriage--when houses in
Warwick Square were cheaper than they are now--and there they carried on
their battle, certainly with success. But two thousand a year does not go
very far in Warwick Square, even though you sit rent free, if you have a
family and absolutely must keep a carriage. It therefore resulted that
when Mr. and Mrs. Hittaway went to Scotland, which they would endeavour to
do every year, it was very important that they should accomplish their
aristocratic holiday as visitors at the house of some aristocratic friend.
So well had they played their cards in this respect that they seldom
failed altogether. In one year they had been the guests of a great marquis
quite in the north, and that had been a very glorious year. To talk of
Stackallan was indeed a thing of beauty. But in that year Mr. Hittaway had
made himself very useful in London. Since that they had been at delicious
shooting lodges in Ross and Inverness-shire, had visited a millionaire at
his palace amid the Argyle mountains, had been fêted in a western island,
had been bored by a Dundee dowager, and put up with a Lothian laird. But
the thing had been almost always done, and the Hittaways were known as
people that went to Scotland. He could handle a gun, and was clever enough
never to shoot a keeper. She could read aloud, could act a little, could
talk or hold her tongue; and let her hosts be who they would, and as
mighty as you please, never caused them trouble by seeming to be out of
their circle and on that account requiring peculiar attention.

On this occasion Mr. and Mrs. Hittaway were the guests of old Lady
Pierrepoint in Dumfries. There was nothing special to recommend Lady
Pierrepoint except that she had a large house and a good income, and that
she liked to have people with her of whom everybody knew something. So far
was Lady Pierrepoint from being high in the Hittaway world, that Mrs.
Hittaway felt herself called upon to explain to her friends that she was
forced to go to Dumdum House by the duties of old friendship. Dear old
Lady Pierrepoint had been insisting on it for the last ten years. And
there was this advantage, that Dumfriesshire is next to Ayrshire, that
Dumdum was not very far--some twenty or thirty miles--from Portray, and
that she might learn something about Lizzie Eustace in her country house.

It was nearly the end of August when the Hittaways left London to stay an
entire month with Lady Pierrepoint. Mr. Hittaway had very frequently
explained his defalcation as to fashion--in that he was remaining in
London for three weeks after Parliament had broken up--by the peculiar
exigencies of the Board of Appeals in that year. To one or two very
intimate friends Mrs. Hittaway had hinted that everything must be made to
give way to this horrid business of Fawn's marriage. "Whatever happens,
and at whatever cost, that must be stopped," she had ventured to say to
Lady Glencora Palliser, who, however, could hardly be called one of her
very intimate friends.

"I don't see it at all," said Lady Glencora. "I think Lady Eustace is very
nice. And why shouldn't she marry Lord Fawn if she's engaged to him?"

"But you have heard of the necklace, Lady Glencora?"

"Yes, I've heard of it. I wish anybody would come to me and try and get my
diamonds! They should hear what I would say."

Mrs. Hittaway greatly admired Lady Glencora, but not the less was she
determined to persevere.

Had Lord Fawn been altogether candid and open with his family at this
time, some trouble might have been saved; for he had almost altogether
resolved that let the consequences be what they might, he would not marry
Lizzie Eustace. But he was afraid to say this even to his own sister. He
had promised to marry the woman, and he must walk very warily or the
objurgations of the world would be too many for him. "It must depend
altogether on her conduct, Clara," he had said when last his sister had
persecuted him on the subject. She was not, however, sorry to have an
opportunity of learning something of the lady's doings. Mr. Hittaway had
more than once called on Mr. Camperdown.

"Yes," Mr. Camperdown had said in answer to a question from Lord Fawn's
brother-in-law, "she would play old gooseberry with the property if we
hadn't some one to look after it. There's a fellow named Gowran who has
lived there all his life, and we depend very much upon him."

It is certainly true that as to many points of conduct women are less nice
than men. Mr. Hittaway would not probably have condescended himself to
employ espionage, but Mrs. Hittaway was less scrupulous. She actually went
down to Troon and had an interview with Mr. Gowran, using freely the names
of Mr. Camperdown and Lord Fawn; and some ten days afterwards Mr. Gowran
travelled as far as Dumfries and Dumdum, and had an interview with Mrs.
Hittaway. The result of all this, and of further inquiries, will be shown
by the following letter from Mrs. Hittaway to her sister Amelia:

"DUMDUM, September 9, 18--.

"MY DEAR AMELIA: Here we are, and here we have to remain to the end of the
month. Of course it suits, and all that; but it is awfully dull. Richmond
for this time of the year is a paradise to it; and as for coming to
Scotland every autumn, I am sick of it. Only what is one to do if one
lives in London? If it wasn't for Orlando and the children I'd brazen it
out, and let people say what they pleased. As for health, I'm never so
well as at home, and I do like having my own things about me. Orlando has
literally nothing to do here. There is no shooting except pheasants, and
that doesn't begin till October.

"But I'm very glad I've come as to Frederic, and the more so, as I have
learned the truth as to that Mr. Greystock. She, Lady Eustace, is a bad
creature in every way. She still pretends that she is engaged to Frederic,
and tells everybody that the marriage is not broken off, and yet she has
her cousin with her, making love to him in the most indecent way. People
used to say in her favour that at any rate she never flirted. I never
quite know what people mean when they talk of flirting. But you may take
my word for it that she allows her cousin to embrace her, and _embraces
him_. I would not say it if I could not prove it. It is horrible to think
of it, when one remembers that she is almost justified in saying that
Frederic is engaged to her.

"No doubt he was engaged to her. It was a great misfortune, but, thank
God, is not yet past remedy. He has some foolish feeling of what he calls
honour; as if a man can be bound in honour to marry a woman who has
deceived him in every point! She still sticks to the diamonds, if she has
not sold them, as I believe she has; and Mr. Camperdown is going to bring
an action against her in the High Court of Chancery. But still Frederic
will not absolutely declare the thing off. I feel, therefore, that it is
my duty to let him know what I have learned. I should be the last to stir
in such a matter unless I was sure I could prove it. But I don't quite
like to write to Frederic. Will mamma see him, and tell him what I say? Of
course you will show this letter to mamma. If not, I must postpone it till
I am in town; but I think it would come better from mamma. Mamma may be
sure that she is a bad woman.

"And now what do you think of your Mr. Greystock? As sure as I am here he
was seen with his arm round his cousin's waist, sitting out of doors,
_kissing her_. I was never taken in by that story of his marrying Lucy
Morris. He is the last man in the world to marry a governess. He is over
head and ears in debt, and if he marries at all, he must marry some one
with money. I really think that mamma and you, and all of you, have been
soft about that girl. I believe she has been a good governess, that is,
good after mamma's easy fashion; and I don't for a moment suppose that she
is doing anything underhand. But a governess with a lover never does suit,
and I'm sure it won't suit in this case. If I were you I would tell her. I
think it would be the best charity. Whether they mean to marry I can't
tell; Mr. Greystock, that is, and this woman; _but they ought to mean it_;
that's all.

"Let me know at once whether mamma will see Frederic, and speak to him
openly. She is quite at liberty to use my name; only nobody but mamma
should see this letter.

"Love to them all.

"Your most affectionate sister,

"CLARA HITTAWAY."

In writing to Amelia instead of to her mother, Mrs. Hittaway was sure that
she was communicating her ideas to at least two persons at Fawn Court, and
that therefore there would be discussion. Had she written to her mother,
her mother might probably have held her peace, and done nothing.




CHAPTER XXXIII

IT WON'T BE TRUE


Mrs. Greystock, in making her proposition respecting Lady Linlithgow,
wrote to Lady Fawn, and by the same post Frank wrote to Lucy. But before
those letters reached Fawn Court there had come that other dreadful letter
from Mrs. Hittaway. The consternation caused at Fawn Court in respect to
Mr. Greystock's treachery almost robbed of its importance the suggestion
made as to Lord Fawn. Could it be possible that this man, who had so
openly and in so manly a manner engaged himself to Lucy Morris, should now
be proposing to himself a marriage with his rich cousin? Lady Fawn did not
believe that it was possible. Clara had not seen those horrid things with
her own eyes, and other people might be liars. But Amelia shook her head.
Amelia evidently believed that all manner of iniquities were possible to
man.

"You see, mamma, the sacrifice he was making was so very great!"

"But he made it!" pleaded Lady Fawn.

"No, mamma, he said he would make it. Men do these things. It is very
horrid, but I think they do them more now than they used to. It seems to
me that nobody cares now what he does, if he's not to be put into prison."
It was resolved between these two wise ones that nothing at the present
should be said to Lucy or to any one of the family. They would wait
awhile, and in the meantime they attempted, as far as it was possible to
make the attempt without express words, to let Lucy understand that she
might remain at Fawn Court if she pleased. While this was going on, Lord
Fawn did come down once again, and on that occasion Lucy simply absented
herself from the dinner-table and from the family circle for that evening.

"He's coming in, and you've got to go to prison again," Nina said to her,
with a kiss.

The matter to which Mrs. Hittaway's letter more specially alluded was
debated between the mother and daughter at great length. They, indeed,
were less brave and less energetic than was the married daughter of the
family; but as they saw Lord Fawn more frequently, they knew better than
Mrs. Hittaway the real state of the case. They felt sure that he was
already sufficiently embittered against Lady Eustace, and thought that
therefore the peculiarly unpleasant task assigned to Lady Fawn need not be
performed. Lady Fawn had not the advantage of living so much in the world
as her daughter, and was oppressed by, perhaps, a squeamish delicacy.

"I really could not tell him about her sitting and--and kissing the man.
Could I, my dear?"

"I couldn't," said Amelia; "but Clara would."

"And to tell the truth," continued Lady Fawn, "I shouldn't care a bit
about it if it was not for poor Lucy. What will become of her if that man
is untrue to her?"

"Nothing on earth would make her believe it, unless it came from himself,"
said Amelia, who really did know something of Lucy's character. "Till he
tells her, or till she knows that he's married, she'll never believe it."

Then, after a few days, there came those other letters from Bobsborough,
one from the dean's wife and the other from Frank. The matter there
proposed it was necessary that they should discuss with Lucy, as the
suggestion had reached Lucy as well as themselves. She at once came to
Lady Fawn with her lover's letter, and with a gentle merry laughing face
declared that the thing would do very well. "I am sure I should get on
with her, and I should know that it wouldn't be for long," said Lucy.

"The truth is, we don't want you to go at all," said Lady Fawn.

"Oh, but I must," said Lucy in her sharp, decided tone. "I must go. I was
bound to wait till I heard from Mr. Greystock, because it is my first duty
to obey him. But of course I can't stay here after what has passed. As
Nina says, it is simply going to prison when Lord Fawn comes here."

"Nina is an impertinent little chit," said Amelia.

"She is the dearest little friend in all the world," said Lucy, "and
always tells the exact truth. I do go to prison, and when he comes I feel
that I ought to go to prison. Of course I must go away. What does it
matter? Lady Linlithgow won't be exactly like you," and she put her little
hand upon Lady Fawn's fat arm caressingly, "and I sha'n't have you all to
spoil me; but I shall be simply waiting till he comes. Everything now must
be no more than waiting till he comes."

If it was to be that he would never come--this was very dreadful. Amelia
clearly thought that "he" would never come, and Lady Fawn was apt to think
her daughter wiser than herself. And if Mr. Greystock were such as Mrs.
Hittaway had described him to be--if there were to be no such coming as
that for which Lucy fondly waited--then there would be reason tenfold
strong why she should not leave Fawn Court and go to Lady Linlithgow. In
such case, when that blow should fall, Lucy would require very different
treatment than might be expected for her from the hands of Lady
Linlithgow. She would fade and fall to the earth like a flower with an
insect at its root. She would be like a wounded branch into which no sap
would run. With such misfortune and wretchedness possibly before her, Lady
Fawn could not endure the idea that Lucy should be turned out to encounter
it all beneath the cold shade of Lady Linlithgow's indifference. "My
dear," she said, "let bygones be bygones. Come down and meet Lord Fawn.
Nobody will say anything. After all, you were provoked very much, and
there has been quite enough about it."

This, from Lady Fawn, was almost miraculous--from Lady Fawn, to whom her
son had ever been the highest of human beings! But Lucy had told the tale
to her lover, and her lover approved of her going. Perhaps there was
acting upon her mind some feeling, of which she was hardly conscious, that
as long as she remained at Fawn Court she would not see her lover. She had
told him that she could make herself supremely happy in the simple
knowledge that he loved her. But we all know how few such declarations
should be taken as true. Of course she was longing to see him. "If he
would only pass by the road," she would say to herself, "so that I might
peep at him through the gate!" She had no formed idea in her own mind that
she would be able to see him should she go to Lady Linlithgow, but still
there would be the chances of her altered life! She would tell Lady
Linlithgow the truth, and why should Lady Linlithgow refuse her so
rational a pleasure? There was, of course, a reason why Frank should not
come to Fawn Court; but the house in Bruton Street need not be closed to
him. "I hardly know how to love you enough," she said to Lady Fawn, "but
indeed I must go. I do so hope the time may come when you and Mr.
Greystock may be friends. Of course it will come. Shall it not?"

"Who can look into the future?" said the wise Amelia.

"Of course if he is your husband we shall love him," said the less wise
Lady Fawn.

"He is to be my husband," said Lucy, springing up. "What do you mean? Do
you mean anything?" Lady Fawn, who was not at all wise, protested that she
meant nothing.

What were they to do? On that special day they merely stipulated that
there should be a day's delay before Lady Fawn answered Mrs. Greystock's
letter, so that she might sleep upon it. The sleeping on it meant that
further discussion which was to take place between Lady Fawn and her
second daughter in her ladyship's bedroom that night. During all this
period the general discomfort of Fawn Court was increased by a certain
sullenness on the part of Augusta, the elder daughter, who knew that
letters had come and that consultations were being held, but who was not
admitted to those consultations. Since the day on which poor Augusta had
been handed over to Lizzie Eustace as her peculiar friend in the family,
there had always existed a feeling that she by her position was debarred
from sympathising in the general desire to be quit of Lizzie; and then,
too, poor Augusta was never thoroughly trusted by that great guide of the
family, Mrs. Hittaway. "She couldn't keep it to herself if you'd give her
gold to do it," Mrs. Hittaway would say. Consequently Augusta was sullen
and conscious of ill-usage.

"Have you fixed upon anything?" she said to Lucy that evening.

"Not quite; only I am to go away."

"I don't see why you should go away at all. Frederic doesn't Come here so
very often, and when he does come he doesn't say much to any one. I
suppose it's all Amelia's doing."

"Nobody wants me to go, only I feel that I ought. Mr. Greystock thinks it
best."

"I suppose he's going to quarrel with us all."

"No, dear. I don't think he wants to quarrel with any one; but above all
he must not quarrel with me. Lord Fawn has quarrelled with him, and that's
a misfortune--just for the present."

"And where are you going?"

"Nothing has been settled yet; but we are talking of Lady Linlithgow--if
she will take me."

"Lady Linlithgow! Oh dear!"

"Won't it do?"

"They say she's the most dreadful old woman in London. Lady Eustace told
such stories about her."

"Do you know, I think I shall rather like it."

But things were very different with Lucy the next morning. That discussion
in Lady Fawn's room was protracted till midnight, and then it was decided
that just a word should be said to Lucy, so that, if possible, she might
be induced to remain at Fawn Court. Lady Fawn was to say the word, and on
the following morning she was closeted with Lucy.

"My dear," she began, "we all want you to do us a particular favour." As
she said this, she held Lucy by the hand, and no one looking at them would
have thought that Lucy was a governess and that Lady Fawn was her
employer.

"Dear Lady Fawn, indeed it is better that I should go."

"Stay just one month."

"I couldn't do that, because then this chance of a home would be gone. Of
course we can't wait a month before we let Mrs. Greystock know."

"We must write to her, of course."

"And then, you see, Mr. Greystock wishes it." Lady Fawn knew that Lucy
could be very firm, and had hardly hoped that anything could be done by
simple persuasion. They had long been accustomed among themselves to call
her obstinate, and knew that even in her acts of obedience she had a way
of obeying after her own fashion. It was as well, therefore, that the
thing to be said should be said at once.

"My dear Lucy, has it ever occurred to you that there may be a slip
between the cup and the lip?"

"What do you mean, Lady Fawn?"

"That sometimes engagements take place which never become more than
engagements. Look at Lord Fawn and Lady Eustace."

"Mr. Greystock and I are not like that," said Lucy, proudly.

"Such things are very dreadful, Lucy, but they do happen."

"Do you mean anything--anything real, Lady Fawn?"

"I have so strong a reliance on your good sense, that I will tell you just
what I do mean. A rumour has reached me that Mr. Greystock is--paying more
attention than he ought to do to Lady Eustace."

"His own cousin!"

"But people marry their cousins, Lucy."

"To whom he has always been just like a brother! I do think that is the
cruellest thing. Because he sacrifices his time and his money and all his
holidays to go and look after her affairs, this is to be said of him! She
hasn't another human being to took after her, and therefore he is obliged
to do it. Of course he has told me all about it. I do think, Lady Fawn, I
do think that is the greatest shame I ever heard."

"But if it should be true----"

"It isn't true."

"But just for the sake of showing you, Lucy----; if it was lo be true."

"It won't be true."

"Surely I may speak to you as your friend, Lucy. You needn't be so abrupt
with me. Will you listen to me, Lucy?"

"Of course I will listen; only nothing that anybody on earth could say
about that would make me believe a word of it."

"Very well! Now just let me go on. If it were to be so----"

"Oh-h, Lady Fawn!"

"Don't be foolish, Lucy. I will say what I've got to say. If--if--. Let me
see. Where was I? I mean just this: You had better remain here till things
are a little more settled. Even if it be only a rumour--and I'm sure I
don't believe it's anything more--you had better hear about it with us,
with friends round you, than with a perfect stranger like Lady Linlithgow.
If anything were to go wrong there, you wouldn't know where to come for
comfort. If anything were wrong with you here, you could come to me as
though I were your mother. Couldn't you now?"

"Indeed, indeed I could. And I will. I always will. Lady Fawn, I love you
and the dear darling girls better than all the world--except Mr.
Greystock. If anything like that were to happen, I think I should creep
here and ask to die in your house. But it won't. And just now it will be
better that I should go away."

It was found at last that Lucy must have her way, and letters were written
both to Mrs. Greystock and to Frank, requesting that the suggested
overtures might at once be made to Lady Linlithgow. Lucy, in her letter to
her lover, was more than ordinarily cheerful and jocose. She had a good
deal to say about Lady Linlithgow that was really droll, and not a word to
say indicative of the slightest fear in the direction of Lady Eustace. She
spoke of poor Lizzie, and declared her conviction that that marriage never
could come off now. "You mustn't be angry when I say that I can't break my
heart for them, for I never did think that they were very much in love. As
for Lord Fawn, of course he is my--ENEMY." And she wrote the word in big
letters. "And as for Lizzie, she's your cousin, and all that. And she's
ever so pretty, and all that. And she's as rich as Croesus, and all that.
But I don't think she'll break her own heart. I would break mine; only--
only--only--. You will understand the rest. If it should come to pass, I
wonder whether 'the duchess' would ever let a poor creature see a friend
of hers in Bruton Street." Frank had once called Lady Linlithgow the
duchess after a certain popular picture in a certain popular book, and
Lucy never forgot anything that Frank had said.

It did come to pass. Mrs. Greystock at once corresponded with Lady
Linlithgow, and Lady Linlithgow, who was at Ramsgate for her autumn
vacation, requested that Lucy Morris might be brought to see her at her
house in London on the second of October. Lady Linlithgow's autumn holiday
always ended on the last day of September. On the second of October Lady
Fawn herself took Lucy up to Bruton Street, and Lady Linlithgow appeared.
"Miss Morris," said Lady Fawn, "thinks it right that you should be told
that she's engaged to be married."

"Who to?" demanded the Countess.

Lucy was as red as fire, although she had especially made up her mind that
she would not blush when the communication was made. "I don't know that
she wishes me to mention the gentleman's name, just at present; but I can
assure you that he is all that he ought to be."

"I hate mysteries," said the Countess.

"If Lady Linlithgow----" began Lucy.

"Oh, it's nothing to me," continued the old woman. "It won't come off for
six months, I suppose?" Lucy gave a mute assurance that there would be no
such difficulty as that. "And he can't come here, Miss Morris." To this
Lucy said nothing. Perhaps she might win over even the Countess, and if
not, she must bear her six months of prolonged exclusion from the light of
day. And so the matter was settled. Lucy was to be taken back to Richmond,
and to come again on the following Monday.

"I don't like this parting at all, Lucy," Lady Fawn said on her way home.

"It is better so, Lady Fawn."

"I hate people going away; but, somehow, you don't feel it as we do."

"You wouldn't say that if you really knew what I do feel."

"There was no reason why you should go. Frederic was getting not to care
for it at all. What's Nina to do now? I can't get another governess after
you. I hate all these sudden breaks up. And all for such a trumpery thing.
If Frederic hasn't forgotten all about it, he ought."

"It hasn't come altogether from him, Lady Fawn."

"How has it come, then?"

"I suppose it is because of Mr. Greystock. I suppose when a girl has
engaged herself to marry a man, she must think more of him than of
anything else."

"Why couldn't you think of him at Fawn Court?"

"Because--because things have been unfortunate. He isn't your friend, not
as yet. Can't you understand, Lady Fawn, that, dear as you all must be to
me, I must live in his friendships, and take his part when there is a
part?"

"Then I suppose that you mean to hate all of us." Lucy could only cry at
hearing this; whereupon Lady Fawn also burst into tears.

On the Sunday before Lucy took her departure, Lord Fawn was again at
Richmond. "Of course you'll come down, just as if nothing had happened,"
said Lydia.

"We'll see," said Lucy.

"Mamma will be very angry, if you don't," said Lydia.

But Lucy had a little plot in her head, and her appearance at the dinner-
table on that Sunday must depend on the manner in which her plot was
executed. After church, Lord Fawn would always hang about the grounds for
a while before going into the house; and on this morning Lucy also
remained outside. She soon found her opportunity, and walked straight up
to him, following him on the path. "Lord Fawn," she said, "I have come to
beg your pardon."

He had turned round hearing footsteps behind him, but still was startled
and unready. "It does not matter at all," he said.

"It matters to me, because I behaved badly."

"What I said about Mr. Greystock wasn't intended to be said to you, you
know."

"Even if it was, it would make no matter. I don't mean to think of that
now. I beg your pardon because I said what I ought not to have said."

"You see, Miss Morris, that as the head of this family----"

"If I had said it to Juniper, I would have begged his pardon." Now Juniper
was the gardener, and Lord Fawn did not quite like the way in which the
thing was put to him. The cloud came across his brow, and he began to fear
that she would again insult him. "I oughtn't to accuse anybody of an
untruth--not in that way; and I am very sorry for what I did, and I beg
your pardon." Then she turned as though she were going back to the house.

But he stopped her. "Miss Morris, if it will suit you to stay with my
mother, I will never say a word against it."

"It is quite settled that I am to go to-morrow, Lord Fawn. Only for that I
would not have troubled you again."

Then she did turn towards the house, but he recalled her. "We will shake
hands, at any rate," he said, "and not part as enemies." So they shook
hands, and Lucy came down and sat in his company at the dinner-table.




CHAPTER XXXIV

LADY LINLITHGOW AT HOME


Lucy, in her letter to her lover, had distinctly asked whether she might
tell Lady Linlithgow the name of her future husband, but had received no
reply when she was taken to Bruton Street. The parting at Richmond was
very painful, and Lady Fawn had declared herself quite unable to make
another journey up to London with the ungrateful runagate. Though there
was no diminution of affection among the Fawns, there was a general
feeling that Lucy was behaving badly. That obstinacy of hers was getting
the better of her. Why should she have gone? Even Lord Fawn had expressed
his desire that she should remain. And then, in the breasts of the wise
ones, all faith in the Greystock engagement had nearly vanished. Another
letter had come from Mrs. Hittaway, who now declared that it was already
understood about Portray that Lady Eustace intended to marry her cousin.
This was described as a terrible crime on the part of Lizzie, though the
antagonistic crime of a remaining desire to marry Lord Fawn was still
imputed to her. And, of course, the one crime heightened the other. So
that words from the eloquent pen of Mrs. Hittaway failed to make dark
enough the blackness of poor Lizzie's character. As for Mr. Greystock, he
was simply a heartless man of the world, wishing to feather his nest. Mrs.
Hittaway did not for a moment believe that he had ever dreamed of marrying
Lucy Morris. Men always have three or four little excitements of that kind
going on for the amusement of their leisure hours; so, at least, said Mrs.
Hittaway. "The girl had better be told at once." Such was her decision
about poor Lucy.

"I can't do more than I have done," said Lady Fawn to Augusta.

"She'll never get over it, mamma; never," said Augusta.

Nothing more was said, and Lucy was sent off in the family carriage. Lydia
and Nina were sent with her, and though there was some weeping on the
journey, there was also much laughing. The character of the "duchess" was
discussed very much at large, and many promises were made as to long
letters. Lucy, in truth, was not unhappy. She would be nearer to Frank;
and then it had been almost promised her that she should go to the
deanery, after a residence of six months with Lady Linlithgow. At the
deanery of course she would see Frank; and she also understood that a long
visit to the deanery would be the surest prelude to that home of her own
of which she was always dreaming.

"Dear me; sent you up in a carriage, has she? Why shouldn't you have come
by the railway?"

"Lady Fawn thought the carriage best. She is so very kind."

"It's what I call twaddle, you know. I hope you ain't afraid of going in a
cab."

"Not in the least, Lady Linlithgow."

"You can't have the carriage to go about here. Indeed, I never have a pair
of horses till after Christmas. I hope you know that I'm as poor as Job."

"I didn't know."

"I am, then. You'll get nothing beyond wholesome food with me. And I'm not
sure it is wholesome always. The butchers are scoundrels and the bakers
are worse. What used you to do at Lady Fawn's?"

"I still did lessons with the two youngest girls."

"You won't have any lessons to do here unless you do 'em with me. You had
a salary there?"

"Oh, yes."

"Fifty pounds a year, I suppose."

"I had eighty."

"Had you, indeed. Eighty pounds, and a coach to ride in!"

"I had a great deal more than that, Lady Linlithgow."

"How do you mean?"

"I had downright love and affection. They were just so many dear friends.
I don't suppose any governess was ever so treated before. It was just like
being at home. The more I laughed the better every one liked it."

"You won't find anything to laugh at here; at least I don't. If you want
to laugh, you can laugh up-stairs or down in the parlour."

"I can do without laughing for a while."

"That's lucky, Miss Morris. If they were all so good to you, what made you
come away? They sent you away, didn't they?"

"Well, I don't know that I can explain it just all. There were a great
many things together. No; they didn't send me away. I came away because it
suited."

"It was something to do with your having a lover, I suppose." To this Lucy
thought it best to make no answer, and the conversation for a while was
dropped.

Lucy had arrived at about half-past three, and Lady Linlithgow was then
sitting in the drawing-room. After the first series of questions and
answers Lucy was allowed to go up to her room, and on her return to the
drawing-room found the Countess still sitting upright in her chair. She
was now busy with accounts, and at first took no notice of Lucy's return.
What were to be the companion's duties? What tasks in the house were to be
assigned to her? What hours were to be her own; and what was to be done in
those of which the Countess would demand the use? Up to the present moment
nothing had been said of all this. She had simply been told that she was
to be Lady Linlithgow's companion, without salary, indeed, but receiving
shelter, guardianship, and bread and meat in return for her services. She
took up a book from the table and sat with it for ten minutes. It was
Tupper's great poem, and she attempted to read it. Lady Linlithgow sat
totting up her figures, but said nothing. She had not spoken a word since
Lucy's return to the room; and as the great poem did not at first
fascinate the new companion--whose mind not unnaturally was somewhat
disturbed--Lucy ventured upon a question. "Is there anything I can do for
you, Lady Linlithgow?"

"Do you know about figures?"

"Oh, yes. I consider myself quite a ready-reckoner."

"Can you make two and two come to five on one side of the sheet and only
come to three on the other?"

"I'm afraid I can't do that and prove it afterwards."

"Then you ain't worth anything to me." Having so declared, Lady Linlithgow
went on with her accounts and Lucy relapsed into her great poem.

"No, my dear," said the Countess, when she had completed her work, "there
isn't anything for you to do. I hope you haven't come here with that
mistaken idea. There won't be any sort of work of any kind expected from
you. I poke my own fires and I carve my own bit of mutton. And I haven't
got a nasty little dog to be washed. And I don't care twopence about
worsted work. I have a maid to darn my stockings, and because she has to
work I pay her wages. I don't like being alone, so I get you to come and
live with me. I breakfast at nine, and if you don't manage to be down by
that time I shall be cross."

"I am always up long before that."

"There's lunch at two, just bread and butter and cheese, and perhaps a bit
of cold meat. There's dinner at seven; and very bad it is, because they
don't have any good meat in London. Down in Fifeshire the meat's a deal
better than it is here, only I never go there now. At half-past ten I go
to bed. It's a pity you're so young, because I don't know what you'll do
about going out. Perhaps, as you ain't pretty, it won't signify."

"Not at all--I should think," said Lucy.

"Perhaps you consider yourself pretty. It's all altered now since I was
young. Girls make monsters of themselves, and I'm told the men like it;
going about with unclean, frowsy structures on their heads, enough to make
a dog sick. They used to be clean and sweet and nice, what one would like
to kiss. How a man can like to kiss a face with a dirty horse's tail all
whizling about it, is what I can't at all understand. I don't think they
do like it, but they have to do it."

"I haven't even a pony's tail," said Lucy.

"They do like to kiss you, I dare say."

"No, they don't," ejaculated Lucy, not knowing what answer to make.

"I haven't hardly looked at you, but you didn't seem to me to be a
beauty."

"You are quite right about that, Lady Linlithgow."

"I hate beauties. My niece, Lizzie Eustace, is a beauty; and I think that,
of all heartless creatures in the world, she is the most heartless."

"I know Lady Eustace very well."

"Of course you do. She was a Greystock, and you know the Greystocks. And
she was down staying with old Lady Fawn at Richmond. I should think old
Lady Fawn had a time with her; hadn't she?"

"It didn't go off very well."

"Lizzie would be too much for the Fawns, I should think. She was too much
for me, I know. She's about as bad as anybody ever was. She's false,
dishonest, heartless, cruel, irreligious, ungrateful, mean, ignorant,
greedy, and vile."

"Good gracious, Lady Linlithgow!"

"She's all that, and a great deal worse. But she is handsome. I don't know
that I ever saw a prettier woman. I generally go out in a cab at three
o'clock, but I sha'n't want you to go with me. I don't know what you can
do. Macnulty used to walk round Grosvenor Square and think that people
mistook her for a lady of quality. You mustn't go and walk round Grosvenor
Square by yourself, you know. Not that I care."

"I'm not a bit afraid of anybody," said Lucy.

"Now you know all about it. There isn't anything for you to do. There are
Miss Edgeworth's novels down-stairs, and 'Pride and Prejudice' in my
bedroom. I don't subscribe to Mudie's, because when I asked for 'Adam
Bede,' they always sent me the 'Bandit Chief.' Perhaps you can borrow
books from your friends at Richmond. I dare say Mrs. Greystock has told
you that I'm very cross."

"I haven't seen Mrs. Greystock for ever so long."

"Then Lady Fawn has told you--or somebody. When the wind is east, or
northeast, or even north, I am cross, for I have the lumbago. It's all
very well talking about being good-humoured. You can't be good-humoured
with the lumbago. And I have the gout sometimes in my knee. I'm cross
enough, then, and so you'd be. And, among 'em all, I don't get much above
half what I ought to have out of my jointure. That makes me very cross. My
teeth are bad, and I like to have the meat tender. But it's always tough,
and that makes me cross. And when people go against the grain with me, as
Lizzie Eustace always did, then I'm very cross."

"I hope you won't be very bad with me," said Lucy.

"I don't bite, if you mean that," said her ladyship.

"I'd sooner be bitten than barked at--sometimes," said Lucy.

"Humph!" said the old woman, and then she went back to her accounts.

Lucy had a few books of her own, and she determined to ask Frank to send
her some. Books are cheap things, and she would not mind asking him for
magazines, and numbers, and perhaps for the loan of a few volumes. In the
mean time she did read Tupper's poem, and "Pride and Prejudice," and one
of Miss Edgeworth's novels--probably for the third time. During the first
week in Bruton Street she would have been comfortable enough, only that
she had not received a line from Frank. That Frank was not specially good
at writing letters, she had already taught herself to understand. She was
inclined to believe that but few men of business do write letters
willingly, but that, of all men, lawyers are the least willing to do so.
How reasonable it was that a man who had to perform a great part of his
daily work with a pen in his hand should loathe a pen when not at work. To
her the writing of letters was perhaps the most delightful occupation of
her life, and the writing of letters to her lover was a foretaste of
heaven; but then men, as she knew, are very different from women. And she
knew this also, that, of all her immediate duties, no duty could be
clearer than that of abstaining from all jealousy, petulance, and
impatient expectation of little attentions. He loved her, and had told her
so, and had promised her that she should be his wife, and that ought to be
enough for her. She was longing for a letter, because she was very anxious
to know whether she might mention his name to Lady Linlithgow; but she
would abstain from any idea of blaming him because the letter did not
come.

On various occasions the Countess showed some little curiosity about the
lover; and at last, after about ten days, when she found herself beginning
to be intimate with her new companion, she put the question point-blank.
"I hate mysteries," she said. "Who is the young man you are to marry?"

"He is a gentleman I've known a long time."

"That's no answer."

"I don't want to tell his name quite yet, Lady Linlithgow."

"Why shouldn't you tell his name, unless it's something improper? Is he a
gentleman?"

"Yes, he is a gentleman."

"And how old?"

"Oh, I don't know; perhaps thirty-two."

"And has he any money?"

"He has his profession."

"I don't like these kind of secrets, Miss Morris. If you won't say who he
is, what was the good of telling me that you were engaged at all? How is a
person to believe it?"

"I don't want you to believe it."

"Highty, tighty!"

"I told you my own part of the affair, because I thought you ought to know
it as I was coming into your house. But I don't see that you ought to know
his part of it. As for not believing, I suppose you believed Lady Fawn?"

"Not a bit better than I believe you. People don't always tell truth
because they have titles, nor yet because they've grown old. He don't live
in London, does he?"

"He generally lives in London. He is a barrister."

"Oh, oh! a barrister, is he? They're always making a heap of money, or
else none at all. Which is it with him?"

"He makes something."

"As much as you could put in your eye and see none the worse." To see the
old lady, as she made this suggestion, turn sharp round upon Lucy, was as
good as a play. "My sister's nephew, the dean's son, is one of the best of
the rising ones, I'm told." Lucy blushed up to her hair, but the dowager's
back was turned, and she did not see the blushes. "But he's in Parliament,
and they tell me he spends his money faster than he makes it. I suppose
you know him?"

"Yes; I knew him at Bobsborough."

"It's my belief that after all this fuss about Lord Fawn, he'll marry his
cousin, Lizzie Eustace. If he's a lawyer, and as sharp as they say, I
suppose he could manage her. I wish he would."

"And she so bad as you say she is!"

"She'll be sure to get somebody, and why shouldn't he have her money as
well as another? There never was a Greystock who didn't want money. That's
what it will come to; you'll see."

"Never," said Lucy decidedly.

"And why not?"

"What I mean is that Mr. Greystock is, at least I should think so from
what I hear, the very last man in the world to marry for money."

"What do you know of what a man would do?"

"It would be a very mean thing; particularly if he does not love her."

"Bother!" said the Countess. "They were very near it in town last year
before Lord Fawn came up at all. I knew as much as that. And it's what
they'll come to before they've done."

"They'll never come to it," said Lucy.

Then a sudden light flashed across the astute mind of the Countess. She
turned round in her chair, and sat for a while silent, looking at Lucy.
Then she slowly asked another question. "He isn't your young man, is he?"
To this Lucy made no reply. "So that's it, is it?" said the dowager.
"You've done me the honour of making my house your home till my own
sister's nephew shall be ready to marry you?"

"And why not?" asked Lucy, rather roughly.

"And Dame Greystock, from Bobsborough, has sent you here to keep you out
of her son's way. I see it all. And that old frump at Richmond has passed
you over to me because she did not choose to have such goings on under her
own eye."

"There have been no goings on," said Lucy.

"And he's to come here, I suppose, when my back's turned?"

"He is not thinking of coming here. I don't know what you mean. Nobody has
done anything wrong to you. I don't know why you say such cruel things."

"He can't afford to marry you, you know."

"I don't know anything about it. Perhaps we must wait ever so long; five
years. That's nobody's business but my own."

"I found it all out, didn't I?"

"Yes, you found it out."

"I'm thinking of that sly old Dame Greystock at Bobsborough sending you
here." Neither on that nor on the two following days did Lady Linlithgow
say a word further to Lucy about her engagement.




CHAPTER XXXV

TOO BAD FOR SYMPATHY


When Frank Greystock left Bobsborough to go to Scotland, he had not said
that he would return, nor had he at that time made up his mind whether he
would do so or no. He had promised to go and shoot in Norfolk, and had
half undertaken to be up in London with Herriot, working. Though it was
holiday-time, still there was plenty of work for him to do, various heavy
cases to get up and papers to be read, if only he could settle himself
down to the doing of it. But the scenes down in Scotland had been of a
nature to make him unfit for steady labour. How was he to sail his bark
through the rocks by which his present voyage was rendered so dangerous?
Of course, to the reader, the way to do so seems to be clear enough. To
work hard at his profession, to explain to his cousin that she had
altogether mistaken his feelings, and to be true to Lucy Morris, was so
manifestly his duty, that to no reader will it appear possible that to any
gentleman there could be a doubt. Instead of the existence of a
difficulty, there was a flood of light upon his path, so the reader will
think; a flood so clear that not to see his way was impossible. A man
carried away by abnormal appetites, and wickedness, and the devil, may of
course commit murder, or forge bills, or become a fraudulent director of a
bankrupt company. And so may a man be untrue to his troth, and leave true
love in pursuit of tinsel, and beauty, and false words, and a large
income. But why should one tell the story of creatures so base? One does
not willingly grovel in gutters, or breathe fetid atmospheres, or live
upon garbage. If we are to deal with heroes and heroines, let us, at any
rate, have heroes and heroines who are above such meanness as falsehood in
love. This Frank Greystock must be little better than a mean villain if he
allows himself to be turned from his allegiance to Lucy Morris for an hour
by the seductions and money of such a one as Lizzie Eustace.

We know the dear old rhyme:

  It is good to be merry and wise,
    It is good to be honest and true;
  It is good to be off with the old love
    Before you are on with the new.

There was never better truth spoken than this, and if all men and women
could follow the advice here given, there would be very little sorrow in
the world. But men and women do not follow it. They are no more able to do
so than they are to use a spear, the staff of which is like a weaver's
beam, or to fight with the sword Excalibar. The more they exercise their
arms, the nearer will they get to using the giant's weapon, or even the
weapon that is divine. But as things are at present, their limbs are limp
and their muscles soft, and overfeeding impedes their breath. They attempt
to be merry without being wise, and have themes about truth and honesty
with which they desire to shackle others, thinking that freedom from such
trammels may be good for themselves. And in that matter of love, though
love is very potent, treachery will sometimes seem to be prudence, and a
hankering after new delights will often interfere with real devotion.

It is very easy to depict a hero, a man absolutely stainless, perfect as
an Arthur, a man honest in all his dealings, equal to all trials, true in
all his speech, indifferent to his own prosperity, struggling for the
general good, and, above all, faithful in love. At any rate, it is as easy
to do that as to tell of the man who is one hour good and the next bad,
who aspires greatly but fails in practice, who sees the higher but too
often follows the lower course. There arose at one time a school of art
which delighted to paint the human face as perfect in beauty; and from
that time to this we are discontented unless every woman is drawn for us
as a Venus, or at least a Madonna. I do not know that we have gained much
by this untrue portraiture, either in beauty or in art. There may be made
for us a pretty thing to look at, no doubt; but we know that that pretty
thing is not really visaged as the mistress whom we serve, and whose
lineaments we desire to perpetuate on the canvas. The winds of heaven, or
the flesh-pots of Egypt, or the midnight gas, passions, pains, and perhaps
rouge and powder, have made her something different. But still there is
the fire of her eye and the eager eloquence of her mouth, and something
too, perhaps, left of the departing innocence of youth, which the painter
might give us without the Venus or the Madonna touches. But the painter
does not dare do it. Indeed, he has painted so long after the other
fashion that he would hate the canvas before him were he to give way to
the rouge-begotten roughness or to the flesh-pots, or even to the winds.
And how, my lord, would you, who are giving hundreds, more than hundreds,
for this portrait of your dear one, like to see it in print from the art
critic of the day, that she is a brazen-faced hoyden who seems to have had
a glass of wine too much, or to have been making hay?

And so also has the reading world taught itself to like best the
characters of all but divine men and women. Let the man who paints with
pen and ink give the gas-light and the flesh-pots, the passions and pains,
the prurient prudence and the rouge-pots and pounce-boxes of the world as
it is, and he will be told that no one can care a straw for his creations.
With whom are we to sympathise? says the reader, who not unnaturally
imagines that a hero should be heroic. Oh, thou, my reader, whose
sympathies are in truth the great and only aim of my work, when you have
called the dearest of your friends round you to your hospitable table, how
many heroes are there sitting at the board? Your bosom friend, even if he
be a knight without fear, he is a knight without reproach? The Ivanhoe
that you know, did he not press Rebecca's hand? Your Lord Evandale, did he
not bring his coronet into play when he strove to win his Edith Bellenden?
Was your Tresilian still true and still forbearing when truth and
forbearance could avail him nothing? And those sweet girls whom you know,
do they never doubt between the poor man they think they love and the rich
man whose riches they know they covet?

Go into the market, either to buy or sell, and name the thing you desire
to part with or to get, as it is, and the market is closed against you.
Middling oats are the sweepings of the granaries. A useful horse is a jade
gone at every point. Good sound port is sloe juice. No assurance short of
A 1 betokens even a pretence to merit. And yet in real life we are content
with oats that are really middling, are very glad to have a useful horse,
and know that if we drink port at all we must drink some that is neither
good nor sound. In those delineations of life and character which we call
novels, a similarly superlative vein is desired. Our own friends around us
are not always merry and wise, nor, alas, always honest and true. They are
often cross and foolish, and sometimes treacherous and false. They are so,
and we are angry. Then we forgive them, not without a consciousness of
imperfection on our own part. And we know, or at least believe, that
though they be sometimes treacherous and false, there is a balance of
good. We cannot have heroes to dine with us. There are none. And were
these heroes to be had, we should not like them. But neither are our
friends villains, whose every aspiration is for evil, and whose every
moment is a struggle for some achievement worthy of the devil.

The persons whom you cannot care for in a novel because they are so bad,
are the very same that you so dearly love in your life because they are so
good. To make them and ourselves somewhat better, not by one spring
heavenward to perfection, because we cannot so use our legs, but by slow
climbing, is, we may presume, the object of all teachers, leaders,
legislators, spiritual pastors, and masters. He who writes tales such as
this probably also has, very humbly, some such object distantly before
him. A picture of surpassing godlike nobleness, a picture of a King Arthur
among men, may perhaps do much. But such pictures cannot do all. When such
a picture is painted, as intending to show what a man should be, it is
true. If painted to show what men are, it is false. The true picture of
life as it is, if it could be adequately painted, would show men what they
are and how they might rise, not indeed to perfection, but one step first,
and then another, on the ladder.

Our hero, Frank Greystock, falling lamentably short in his heroism, was
not in a happy state of mind when he reached Bobsborough. It may be that
he returned to his own borough and to his mother's arms because he felt
that were he to determine to be false to Lucy he would there receive
sympathy in his treachery. His mother would, at any rate, think that it
was well, and his father would acknowledge that the fault committed was in
the original engagement with poor Lucy, and not in the treachery. He had
written that letter to her in his chambers one night in a fit of ecstasy;
and could it be right that the ruin of a whole life should be the
consequence?

It can hardly be too strongly asserted that Lizzie Greystock did not
appear to Frank as she has been made to appear to the reader. In all this
affair of the necklace he was beginning to believe that she was really an
ill-used woman; and as to other traits in Lizzie's character, traits which
he had seen, and which were not of a nature to attract, it must be
remembered that beauty reclining in a man's arms does go far toward
washing white the lovely blackamoor. Lady Linlithgow, upon whom Lizzie's
beauty could have no effect of that kind, had nevertheless declared her to
be very beautiful. And this loveliness was of a nature that was altogether
pleasing, if once the beholder of it could get over the idea of falseness
which certainly Lizzie's eye was apt to convey to the beholder. There was
no unclean horse's tail. There was no get-up of flounces, and padding, and
paint, and hair, with a dorsal excrescence appended, with the object
surely of showing in triumph how much absurd ugliness women can force men
to endure. She was lithe, and active, and bright, and was at this moment
of her life at her best. Her growing charms had as yet hardly reached the
limits of full feminine loveliness, which, when reached, have been
surpassed. Luxuriant beauty had with her not as yet become comeliness; nor
had age or the good things of the world added a pound to the fairy
lightness of her footstep. All this had been tendered to Frank, and with
it that worldly wealth which was so absolutely necessary to his career.
For though Greystock would not have said to any man or woman that nature
had intended him to be a spender of much money and a consumer of many good
things, he did undoubtedly so think of himself. He was a Greystock, and to
what miseries would he not reduce his Lucy if, burdened by such
propensities, he were to marry her and then become an aristocratic pauper!

The offer of herself by a woman to a man is, to us all, a thing so
distasteful that we at once declare that the woman must be abominable.
There shall be no whitewashing of Lizzie Eustace. She was abominable. But
the man to whom the offer is made hardly sees the thing in the same light.
He is disposed to believe that, in his peculiar case, there are
circumstances by which the woman is, if not justified, at least excused.
Frank did put faith in his cousin's love for himself. He did credit her
when she told him that she had accepted Lord Fawn's offer in pique,
because he had not come to her when he had promised that he would come. It
did seem natural to him that she should have desired to adhere to her
engagement when he would not advise her to depart from it. And then her
jealousy about Lucy's ring, and her abuse of Lucy, were proofs to him of
her love. Unless she loved him, why should she care to marry him? What was
his position that she should desire to share it, unless she so desired
because he was dearer to her than aught beside? He had not eyes clear
enough to perceive that his cousin was a witch whistling for a wind, and
ready to take the first blast that would carry her and her broomstick
somewhere into the sky. And then, in that matter of the offer, which in
ordinary circumstances certainly should not have come from her to him, did
not the fact of her wealth and of his comparative poverty cleanse her from
such stain as would, in usual circumstances, attach to a woman who is so
forward? He had not acceded to her proposition. He had not denied his
engagement to Lucy. He had left her presence without a word of
encouragement, because of that engagement. But he believed that Lizzie was
sincere. He believed, now, that she was genuine; though he had previously
been all but sure that falsehood and artifice were second nature to her.

At Bobsborough he met his constituents, and made them the normal autumn
speech. The men of Bobsborough were well pleased and gave him a vote of
confidence. As none but those of his own party attended the meeting, it
was not wonderful that the vote was unanimous. His father, mother, and
sister all heard his speech, and there was a strong family feeling that
Frank was born to set the Greystocks once more upon their legs. When a man
can say what he likes with the certainty that every word will be reported,
and can speak to those around him as one manifestly their superior, he
always looms large. When the Conservatives should return to their proper
place at the head of affairs, there could be no doubt that Frank Greystock
would be made Solicitor-General. There were not wanting even ardent
admirers who conceived that, with such claims and such talents as his, the
ordinary steps in political promotion would not be needed, and that he
would become Attorney-General at once. All men began to say all good
things to the dean, and to Mrs. Greystock it seemed that the woolsack, or
at least the Queen's Bench with a peerage, was hardly an uncertainty. But
then, there must be no marriage with a penniless governess. If he would
only marry his cousin, one might say that the woolsack was won.

Then came Lucy's letter; the pretty, dear, joking letter about the
"duchess" and broken hearts. "I would break my heart, only--only--only--."
Yes, he knew very well what she meant. I shall never be called upon to
break my heart, because you are not a false scoundrel. If you were a false
scoundrel--instead of being, as you are, a pearl among men--then I should
break my heart. That was what Lucy meant. She could not have been much
clearer, and he understood it perfectly. It is very nice to walk about
one's own borough and be voted unanimously worthy of confidence, and be a
great man; but if you are a scoundrel, and not used to being a scoundrel,
black care is apt to sit very close behind you as you go caracoling along
the streets.

Lucy's letter required an answer, and how should he answer it? He
certainly did not wish her to tell Lady Linlithgow of her engagement, but
Lucy clearly wished to be allowed to tell, and on what ground could he
enjoin her to be silent? He knew, or he thought he knew, that till he
answered the letter, she would not tell his secret; and therefore from day
to day he put off the answer. A man does not write a love-letter usually
when he is in doubt himself whether he does or does not mean to be a
scoundrel.

Then there came a letter to "Dame" Greystock, from Lady Linlithgow, which
filled them all with amazement.

"MY DEAR MADAM," began the letter:

"Seeing that your son is engaged to many Miss Morris--at least she says
so--you ought not to have sent her here without telling me all about it.
She says you know of the match, and she says that I can write to you if I
please. Of course I can do that without her leave. But it seems to me that
if you know all about it, and approve the marriage, your house and not
mine would be the proper place for her.

"I'm told that Mr. Greystock is a great man. Any lady being with me as my
companion can't be a great woman. But perhaps you wanted to break it off;
else you would have told me. She shall stay here six months, but then she
must go.

"Yours truly,

"SUSANNA LINLITHGOW."

It was considered absolutely necessary that this letter should be shown to
Frank. "You see," said his mother, "she told the old lady at once."

"I don't see why she shouldn't." Nevertheless Frank was annoyed. Having
asked for permission, Lucy should at least have waited for a reply.

"Well, I don't know," said Mrs. Greystock. "It is generally considered
that young ladies are more reticent about such things. She has blurted it
out and boasted about it at once."

"I thought girls always told of their engagements," said Frank, "and I
can't for the life of me see that there was any boasting in it." Then he
was silent for a moment. "The truth is, we are all of us treating Lucy
very badly."

"I cannot say that I see it," said his mother.

"We ought to have had her here."

"For how long, Frank?"

"For as long as a home was needed by her."

"Had you demanded it, Frank, she should have come, of course. But neither
I nor your father could have had pleasure in receiving her as your future
wife. You yourself say that it cannot be for two years at least."

"I said one year."

"I think, Frank, you said two. And we all know that such a marriage would
be ruinous to you. How could we make her welcome? Can you see your way to
having a house for her to live in within twelve months?"

"Why not a house? I could have a house to-morrow."

"Such a house as would suit you in your position? And, Frank, would it be
a kindness to marry her and then let her find that you were in debt?"

"I don't believe she'd care if she had nothing but a crust to eat."

"She ought to care, Frank."

"I think," said the dean to his son on the next day, "that in our class of
life an imprudent marriage is the one thing that should be avoided. My
marriage has been very happy, God knows; but I have always been a poor
man, and feel it now when I am quite unable to help you. And yet your
mother had some fortune. Nobody, I think, cares less for wealth than I do.
I am content almost with nothing."--The nothing with which the dean had
hitherto been contented had always included every comfort of life, a well-
kept table, good wine, new books, and canonical habiliments with the gloss
still on; but as the Bobsborough tradesmen had, through the agency of Mrs.
Greystock, always supplied him with these things as though they came from
the clouds, he really did believe that he had never asked for anything.--
"I am content almost with nothing. But I do feel that marriage cannot be
adopted as the ordinary form of life by men in our class as it can be by
the rich or by the poor. You, for instance, are called upon to live with
the rich, but are not rich. That can only be done by wary walking, and is
hardly consistent with a wife and children."

"But men in my position do marry, sir."

"After a certain age; or else they marry ladies with money. You see,
Frank, there are not many men who go into Parliament with means so
moderate as yours; and they who do, perhaps have stricter ideas of
economy." The dean did not say a word about Lucy Morris, and dealt
entirely with generalities.

In compliance with her son's advice--or almost command--Mrs. Greystock did
not answer Lady Linlithgow's letter. He was going back to London, and
would give personally, or by letter written there, what answer might be
necessary.

"You will then see Miss Morris?" asked his mother.

"I shall certainly see Lucy. Something must be settled." There was a tone
in his voice as he said this which gave some comfort to his mother.




CHAPTER XXXVI

LIZZIE'S GUESTS


True to their words, at the end of October, Mrs. Carbuncle and Miss
Roanoke, and Lord George de Bruce Carruthers and Sir Griffin Tewett,
arrived at Portray Castle. And for a couple of days there was a visitor
whom Lizzie was very glad to welcome, but of whose good nature on the
occasion Mr. Camperdown thought very ill indeed. This was John Eustace.
His sister-in-law wrote to him in very pressing language; and as--so he
said to Mr. Camperdown--he did not wish to seem to quarrel with his
brother's widow as long as such seeming might be avoided, he accepted the
invitation. If there was to be a lawsuit about the diamonds, that must be
Mr. Camperdown's affair. Lizzie had never entertained her friends in style
before. She had had a few people to dine with her in London and once or
twice had received company on an evening. But in all her London doings
there had been the trepidation of fear, to be accounted for by her youth
and widowhood; and it was at Portray--her own house at Portray--that it
would best become her to exercise hospitality. She had bided her time even
there, but now she meant to show her friends that she had got a house of
her own.

She wrote even to her husband's uncle, the bishop, asking him down to
Portray. He could not come, but sent an affectionate answer, and thanked
her for thinking of him. Many people she asked who, she felt sure, would
not come, and one or two of them accepted her invitation. John Eustace
promised to be with her for two days. When Frank had left her, going out
of her presence in the manner that has been described, she actually wrote
to him, begging him to join her party. This was her note:

"Come to me, just for a week," she said, "when my people are here, so that
I may not seem to be deserted. Sit at the bottom of my table, and be to me
as a brother might. I shall expect you to do so much for me." To this he
replied that he would come during the first week in November.

And she got a clergyman down from London--the Rev. Joseph Emilius, of whom
it was said that he was born a Jew in Hungary, and that his name in his
own country had been Mealyus. At the present time he was among the most
eloquent of London preachers, and was reputed by some to have reached such
a standard of pulpit oratory as to have had no equal within the memory of
living hearers. In regard to his reading it was acknowledged that no one
since Mrs. Siddons had touched him. But he did not get on very well with
any particular bishop, and there was doubt in the minds of some people
whether there was or was not any--Mrs. Emilius. He had come up quite
suddenly within the last season, and had made church-going quite a
pleasant occupation to Lizzie Eustace.

On the last day of October Mr. Emilius and Mr. John Eustace came, each
alone. Mrs. Carbuncle and Miss Roanoke came over with post-horses from
Ayr, as also did Lord George and Sir Griffin about an hour after them.
Frank was not yet expected. He had promised to name a day, and had not yet
named it.

"Varra weel, varra weel," Gowran had said when he was told of what was
about to occur, and was desired to make preparations necessary in regard
to the outside plenishing of the house; "nae doot she'll do with her ain
what pleases her ainself. The mair ye poor out, the less there'll be left
in. Mr. Jo-ohn coming? I'll be glad then to see Mr. Jo-ohn. Oo, ay; aits;
there'll be aits eneuch. And anither coo! You'll want twa ither coos. I'll
see to the coos." And Andy Gowran, in spite of the internecine warfare
which existed between him and his mistress, did see to the hay, and the
cows, and the oats, and the extra servants that were wanted inside and
outside the house. There was enmity between him and Lady Eustace, and he
didn't care who knew it; but he took her wages and he did her work.

Mrs. Carbuncle was a wonderful woman. She was the wife of a man with whom
she was very rarely seen, whom nobody knew, who was something in the City,
but somebody who never succeeded in making money; and yet she went
everywhere. She had at least the reputation of going everywhere, and did
go to a great many places. Carbuncle had no money--so it was said; and she
had none. She was the daughter of a man who had gone to New York and had
failed there. Of her own parentage no more was known. She had a small
house in one of the very small May Fair streets, to which she was wont to
invite her friends for five o'clock tea. Other receptions she never
attempted. During the London seasons she always kept a carriage, and
during the winters she always had hunters. Who paid for them no one knew
or cared. Her dress was always perfect, as far as fit and performance
went. As to approving Mrs. Carbuncle's manner of dress--that was a
question of taste. Audacity may, perhaps, be said to have been the ruling
principle of her toilet; not the audacity of indecency, which, let the
satirists say what they may, is not efficacious in England, but audacity
in colour, audacity in design, and audacity in construction. She would
ride in the park in a black and yellow habit, and appear at the opera in
white velvet without a speck of colour. Though certainly turned thirty,
and probably nearer to forty, she would wear her jet-black hair streaming
down her back, and when June came would drive about London in a straw hat.
But yet it was always admitted that she was well dressed. And then would
arise that question, Who paid the bills?

Mrs. Carbuncle was certainly a handsome woman. She was full-faced, with
bold eyes, rather far apart, perfect black eyebrows, a well-formed broad
nose, thick lips, and regular teeth. Her chin was round and short, with
perhaps a little bearing towards a double chin. But though her face was
plump and round, there was a power in it, and a look of command, of which
it was perhaps difficult to say in what features was the seat. But in
truth the mind will lend a tone to every feature, and it was the desire of
Mrs. Carbuncle's heart to command. But perhaps the wonder of her face was
its complexion. People said, before they knew her, that, as a matter of
course, she had been made beautiful forever. But, though that too
brilliant colour was almost always there, covering the cheeks but never
touching the forehead or the neck, it would at certain moments shift,
change, and even depart. When she was angry, it would vanish for a moment
and then return intensified. There was no chemistry on Mrs. Carbuncle's
cheek; and yet it was a tint so brilliant and so little transparent as
almost to justify a conviction that it could not be genuine. There were
those who declared that nothing in the way of complexion so beautiful as
that of Mrs. Carbuncle's had been seen on the face of any other woman in
this age, and there were others who called her an exaggerated milkmaid.
She was tall, too, and had learned so to walk as though half the world
belonged to her.

Her niece, Miss Roanoke, was a lady of the same stamp, and of similar
beauty, with those additions and also with those drawbacks which belong to
youth. She looked as though she were four-and-twenty, but in truth she was
no more than eighteen. When seen beside her aunt, she seemed to be no more
than half the elder lady's size; and yet her proportions were not
insignificant. She, too, was tall, and was as one used to command, and
walked as though she were a young Juno. Her hair was very dark--almost
black--and very plentiful. Her eyes were large and bright, though too bold
for a girl so young. Her nose and mouth were exactly as her aunt's, but
her chin was somewhat longer, so as to divest her face of that plump
roundness which perhaps took something from the majesty of Mrs.
Carbuncle's appearance. Miss Roanoke's complexion was certainly
marvellous. No one thought that she had been made beautiful forever, for
the colour would go and come and shift and change with every word and
every thought; but still it was there, as deep on her cheeks as on her
aunt's, though somewhat more transparent, and with more delicacy of tint
as the bright hues faded away and became merged in the almost marble
whiteness of her skin. With Mrs. Carbuncle there was no merging and
fading. The red and white bordered one another on her cheek without any
merging, as they do on a flag.

Lucinda Roanoke was undoubtedly a very handsome woman. It probably never
occurred to man or woman to say that she was lovely. She had sat for her
portrait during the last winter, and her picture had caused much remark in
the Exhibition. Some said that she might be a Brinvilliers, others a
Cleopatra, and others again a Queen of Sheba. In her eyes as they were
limned there had been nothing certainly of love, but they who likened her
to the Egyptian queen believed that Cleopatra's love had always been used
simply to assist her ambition. They who took the Brinvilliers side of the
controversy were men so used to softness and flattery from women as to
have learned to think that a woman silent, arrogant, and hard of approach,
must be always meditating murder. The disciples of the Queen of Sheba
school, who formed perhaps the more numerous party, were led to their
opinion by the majesty of Lucinda's demeanour rather than by any clear
idea in their own minds of the lady who visited Solomon. All men, however,
agreed in this, that Lucinda Roanoke was very handsome, but that she was
not the sort of girl with whom a man would wish to stray away through the
distant beech-trees at a picnic.

In truth she was silent, grave, and, if not really haughty, subject to all
the signs of haughtiness. She went everywhere with her aunt, and allowed
herself to be walked out at dances, and to be accosted when on horseback,
and to be spoken to at parties; but she seemed hardly to trouble herself
to talk; and as for laughing, flirting, or giggling, one might as well
expect such levity from a marble Minerva. During the last winter she had
taken to hunting with her aunt, and already could ride well to hounds. If
assistance were wanted at a gate, or in the management of a fence, and the
servant who attended the two ladies were not near enough to give it, she
would accept it as her due from the man nearest to her; but she rarely did
more than bow her thanks, and, even by young lords, or hard-riding
handsome colonels, or squires of undoubted thousands, she could hardly
ever be brought to what might be called a proper hunting-field
conversation. All of which things were noted, and spoken of, and admired.
It must be presumed that Lucinda Roanoke was in want of a husband, and yet
no girl seemed to take less pains to get one. A girl ought not to be
always busying herself to bring down a man, but a girl ought to give
herself some charms. A girl so handsome as Lucinda Roanoke, with pluck
enough to ride like a bird, dignity enough for a duchess, and who was
undoubtedly clever, ought to put herself in the way of taking such good
things as her charms and merits would bring her; but Lucinda Roanoke stood
aloof and despised everybody. So it was that Lucinda was spoken of when
her name was mentioned; and her name was mentioned a good deal after the
opening of the exhibition of pictures.

There was some difficulty about her--as to who she was. That she was an
American was the received opinion. Her mother, as well as Mrs. Carbuncle,
had certainly been in New York. Carbuncle was a London man; but it was
supposed that Mr. Roanoke was, or had been, an American. The received
opinion was correct. Lucinda had been born in New York, had been educated
there till she was sixteen, and then been taken to Paris for nine months,
and from Paris had been brought to London by her aunt. Mrs. Carbuncle
always spoke of Lucinda's education as having been thoroughly Parisian. Of
her own education and antecedents, Lucinda never spoke at all. "I'll tell
you what it is," said a young scamp from Eton to his elder sister, when
her character and position were once being discussed, "she's a heroine,
and would shoot a fellow as soon as look at him." In that scamp's family
Lucinda was ever afterwards called the heroine.

The manner in which Lord George de Bruce Carruthers had attached himself
to these ladies was a mystery; but then Lord George was always mysterious.
He was a young man--so considered--about forty-five years of age, who had
never done anything in the manner of other people. He hunted a great deal,
but he did not fraternise with hunting men, and would appear now in this
county and now in that, with an utter disregard of grass, fences,
friendships, or foxes. Leicester, Essex, Ayrshire, or the Baron had equal
delights for him; and in all counties he was quite at home. He had never
owned a fortune, and had never been known to earn a shilling. It was said
that early in life he had been apprenticed to an attorney at Aberdeen as
George Carruthers. His third cousin, the Marquis of Killiecrankie, had
been killed out hunting; the second scion of the noble family had fallen
at Balaclava; a third had perished in the Indian Mutiny; and a fourth, who
did reign for a few months, died suddenly, leaving a large family of
daughters. Within three years the four brothers vanished, leaving among
them no male heir, and George's elder brother, who was then in a West
India regiment, was called home from Demerara to be Marquis of
Killiecrankie. By a usual exercise of the courtesy of the Crown, all the
brothers were made lords, and some twelve years before the date of our
story George Carruthers, who had long since left the attorney's office at
Aberdeen, became Lord George de Carruthers. How he lived no one knew. That
his brother did much for him was presumed to be impossible, as the
property entailed on the Killiecrankie title certainly was not large. He
sometimes went into the City, and was supposed to know something about
shares. Perhaps he played a little, and made a few bets. He generally
lived with men of means, or perhaps with one man of means at a time; but
they who knew him well declared that he never borrowed a shilling from a
friend, and never owed a guinea to a tradesman. He always had horses, but
never had a home. When in London he lodged in a single room, and dined at
his club. He was a Colonel of Volunteers, having got up the regiment known
as the Long Shore Riflemen--the roughest regiment of volunteers in all
England--and was reputed to be a bitter Radical. He was suspected even of
republican sentiments, and ignorant young men about London hinted that he
was the grand centre of the British Fenians. He had been invited to stand
for the Tower Hamlets, but had told the deputation which waited upon him
that he knew a thing worth two of that. Would they guarantee his expenses,
and then give him a salary? The deputation doubted its ability to promise
so much. "I more than doubt it," said Lord George; and then the deputation
went away.

In person he was a long-legged, long-bodied, long-faced man, with rough
whiskers and a rough beard on his upper lip but with a shorn chin. His
eyes were very deep set in his head, and his cheeks were hollow and
sallow; and yet he looked to be and was a powerful, healthy man. He had
large hands, which seemed to be all bone, and long arms, and a neck which
looked to be long, because he so wore his shirt that much of his throat
was always bare. It was manifest enough that he liked to have good-looking
women about him, and yet nobody presumed it probable that he would marry.
For the last two or three years there had been friendship between him and
Mrs. Carbuncle; and during the last season he had become almost intimate
with our Lizzie. Lizzie thought that perhaps he might be the Corsair whom,
sooner or later in her life, she must certainly encounter.

Sir Griffin Tewett, who at the present period of his existence was being
led about by Lord George, was not exactly an amiable young baronet. Nor
were his circumstances such as make a man amiable. He was nominally not
only the heir to, but actually the possessor of a large property; but he
could not touch the principal, and of the income only so much as certain
legal curmudgeons would allow him. As Greystock had said, everybody was at
law with him, so successful had been his father in mismanaging, and
miscontrolling, and misappropriating the property. Tewett Hall had gone to
rack and ruin for four years, and was now let almost for nothing. He was a
fair, frail young man, with a bad eye, and a weak mouth, and a thin hand,
who was fond of liqueurs, and hated to the death any acquaintance who won
a five-pound note of him, or any tradesman who wished to have his bill
paid. But he had this redeeming quality--that having found Lucinda Roanoke
to be the handsomest woman he had ever seen, he did desire to make her his
wife.

Such were the friends whom Lizzie Eustace received at Portray Castle on
the first day of her grand hospitality--together with John Eustace and Mr.
Joseph Emilius, the fashionable preacher from May Fair.




CHAPTER XXXVII

LIZZIE'S FIRST DAY


The coming of John Eustace was certainly a great thing for Lizzie, though
it was only for two days. It saved her from that feeling of desertion
before her friends--desertion by those who might naturally belong to her--
which would otherwise have afflicted her. His presence there for two days
gave her a start. She could call him John, and bring down her boy to him,
and remind him, with the sweetest smile--with almost a tear in her eye--
that he was the boy's guardian. "Little fellow! So much depends on that
little life, does it not, John?" she said, whispering the words into his
ear.

"Lucky little dog!" said John, patting the boy's head. "Let me see! of
course he'll go to Eton."

"Not yet," said Lizzie with a shudder.

"Well, no, hardly; when he's twelve." And then the boy was done with and
was carried away. She had played that card and had turned her trick. John
Eustace was a thoroughly good-natured man of the world, who could forgive
many faults, not expecting people to be perfect. He did not like Mrs.
Carbuncle; was indifferent to Lucinda's beauty; was afraid of that Tartar,
Lord George; and thoroughly despised Sir Griffin. In his heart he believed
Mr. Emilius to be an impostor, who might, for aught he knew, pick his
pocket: and Miss Macnulty had no attraction for him. But he smiled, and
was gay, and called Lady Eustace by her Christian name, and was content to
be of use to her in showing her friends that she had not been altogether
dropped by the Eustace people.

"I got such a nice affectionate letter from the dear bishop," said Lizzie,
"but he couldn't come. He could not escape a previous engagement."

"It's a long way," said John, "and he's not so young as he was once; and
then there are the Bobsborough parsons to look after."

"I don't suppose anything of that kind stops him," said Lizzie, who did
not think it possible that a bishop's bliss should be alloyed by work.
John was so very nice that she almost made up her mind to talk to him
about the necklace; but she was cautious, and thought of it, and found
that it would be better that she should abstain. John Eustace was
certainly very good-natured, but perhaps he might say an ugly word to her
if she were rash. She refrained, therefore, and after breakfast on the
second day he took his departure with out an allusion to things that were
unpleasant.

"I call my brother-in-law a perfect gentleman," said Lizzie with
enthusiasm, when his back was turned.

"Certainly," said Mrs. Carbuncle. "He seems to me to be very quiet."

"He didn't quite like his party," said Lord George.

"I am sure he did," said Lizzie.

"I mean as to politics. To him we are all turbulent demagogues and
Bohemians. Eustace is an old-world Tory, if there's one left anywhere. But
you're right, Lady Eustace; he is a gentleman."

"He knows on which side his bread is buttered as well as any man," said
Sir Griffin.

"Am I a demagogue," said Lizzie, appealing to the Corsair, "or a Bohemian?
I didn't know it."

"A little in that way, I think, Lady Eustace; not a demagogue, but
demagogical; not Bohemian, but that way given."

"And is Miss Roanoke demagogical?"

"Certainly," said Lord George. "I hardly wrong you there, Miss Roanoke?"

"Lucinda is a democrat, but hardly a demagogue, Lord George," said Mrs.
Carbuncle.

"Those are distinctions which we hardly understand on this thick-headed
side of the water. But demagogues, democrats, demonstrations, and
Demosthenic oratory are all equally odious to John Eustace. For a young
man he's about the best Tory I know."

"He is true to his colours," said Mr. Emilius, who had been endeavouring
to awake the attention of Miss Roanoke on the subject of Shakespeare's
dramatic action, "and I like men who are true to their colours." Mr.
Mealyus spoke with the slightest possible tone of foreign accent--a tone
so slight that it simply served to attract attention to him.

While Eustace was still in the house, there had come a letter from Frank
Greystock, saying that he would reach Portray, by way of Glasgow, on
Wednesday, the 5th of November. He must sleep in Glasgow on that night,
having business, or friends, or pleasure demanding his attention in that
prosperous mart of commerce. It had been impressed upon him that he should
hunt, and he had consented. There was to be a meet out on the Kilmarnock
side of the county on that Wednesday, and he would bring a horse with him
from Glasgow. Even in Glasgow a hunter was to be hired, and could be sent
forty or fifty miles out of the town in the morning and brought back in
the evening. Lizzie had learned all about that, and had told him. If he
would call at MacFarlane's stables in Buchanan Street, or even write to
Mr. MacFarlane, he would be sure to get a horse that would carry him.
MacFarlane was sending horses down into the Ayrshire country every day of
his life. It was simply an affair of money. Three guineas for the horse,
and then just the expense of the railway. Frank, who knew quite as much
about it as did his cousin, and who never thought much of guineas or of
railway tickets, promised to meet the party at the meet ready equipped.
His things would go on by train, and Lizzie must send for them to Troon.
He presumed a beneficent Providence would take the horse back to the bosom
of Mr. MacFarlane. Such was the tenor of his letter. "If he don't mind,
he'll find himself astray," said Sir Griffin. "He'll have to go one way by
rail and his horse another."

"We can manage better for our cousin than that," said Lizzie, with a
rebuking nod.

But there was hunting from Portray before Frank Greystock came. It was
specially a hunting party, and Lizzie was to be introduced to the glories
of the field. In giving her her due, it must be acknowledged that she was
fit for the work. She rode well, though she had not ridden to hounds, and
her courage was cool. She looked well on horseback, and had that presence
of mind which should never desert a lady when she is hunting. A couple of
horses had been purchased for her, under Lord George's superintendence--
his conjointly with Mrs. Carbuncle's--and had been at the castle for the
last ten days, "eating their varra heeds off," as Andy Gowran had said in
sorrow. There had been practising even while John Eustace was there, and
before her preceptors had slept three nights at the castle she had ridden
backward and forward half a dozen times over a stone wall.

"Oh, yes," Lucinda had said, in answer to a remark from Sir Griffin, "it's
easy enough--till you come across something difficult."

"Nothing difficult stops you," said Sir Griffin; to which compliment
Lucinda vouchsafed no reply.

On the Monday Lizzie went out hunting for the first time in her life. It
must be owned that, as she put her habit on, and afterwards breakfasted
with all her guests in hunting gear around her, and then was driven with
them in her own carriage to the meet, there was something of trepidation
at her heart. And her feeling of cautious fear in regard to money had
received a shock. Mrs. Carbuncle had told her that a couple of horses fit
to carry her might perhaps cost her about £180. Lord George had received
the commission, and the check required from her had been for £320. Of
course she had written the check without a word, but it did begin to occur
to her that hunting was an expensive amusement. Gowran had informed her
that he had bought a rick of hay from a neighbour for £75 15_s._ 9_d._
"God forgie me," said Andy, "but I b'lieve I've been o'er hard on the puir
man in your leddyship's service." £75 15_s._ 9_d._ did seem a great deal
of money to pay; and could it be necessary that she should buy a whole
rick? There were to be eight horses in the stable. To what friend could
she apply to learn how much of a rick of hay one horse ought to eat in a
month of hunting? In such a matter she might have trusted Andy Gowran
implicitly; but how was she to know that? And then, what if at some
desperate fence she were to be thrown off and break her nose and knock out
her front teeth! Was the game worth the candle? She was by no means sure
that she liked Mrs. Carbuncle very much. And though she liked Lord George
very well, could it be possible that he bought the horses for £90 each and
charged her £160? Corsairs do do these sort of things. The horses
themselves were two sweet dears, with stars on their foreheads, and
shining coats, and a delicious aptitude for jumping over everything at a
moment's notice. Lord George had not, in truth, made a penny by them, and
they were good hunters, worth the money; but how was Lizzie to know that?
But though she doubted, and was full of fears, she could smile and look as
though she liked it. If the worst should come she could certainly get
money for the diamonds.

On that Monday the meet was comparatively near to them--distant only
twelve miles. On the following Wednesday it would be sixteen, and they
would use the railway, having the carriage sent to meet them in the
evening. The three ladies and Lord George filled the carriage, and Sir
Griffin was perched upon the box. The ladies' horses had gone on with two
grooms, and those for Lord George and Sir Griffin were to come to the
meet. Lizzie felt somewhat proud of her establishment and her equipage,
but at the same time somewhat fearful. Hitherto she knew but very little
of the country people, and was not sure how she might be received; and
then how would it be with her if the fox should at once start away across
country, and she should lack either the pluck or the power to follow?
There was Sir Griffin to look after Miss Roanoke, and Lord George to
attend to Mrs. Carbuncle. At last an idea so horrible struck her that she
could not keep it down. "What am I to do," she said, "if I find myself all
alone in a field, and everybody else gone away?"

"We won't treat you quite in that fashion," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"The only possible way in which you can be alone in a field is that you
will have cut everybody else down," said Lord George.

"I suppose it will all come right," said Lizzie, plucking up her courage,
and telling herself that a woman can die but once.

Everything was right--as it usually is. The horses were there--quite a
throng of horses, as the two gentlemen had two each; and there was,
moreover, a mounted groom to look after the three ladies. Lizzie had
desired to have a groom to herself, but had been told that the expenditure
in horseflesh was more than the stable could stand. "All I ever want of a
man is to carry for me my flask, and waterproof, and luncheon," said Mrs.
Carbuncle. "I don't care if I never see a groom, except for that."

"It's convenient to have a gate opened sometimes," said Lucinda, slowly.

"Will no one but a groom do that for you?" asked Sir Griffin.

"Gentlemen can't open gates," said Lucinda. Now, as Sir Griffin thought
that he had opened many gates during the last season for Miss Roanoke, he
felt this to be hard.

But there were eight horses, and eight horses with three servants and a
carriage made quite a throng. Among the crowd of Ayrshire hunting men--a
lord or two, a dozen lairds, two dozen farmers, and as many men of
business out of Ayr, Kilmarnock, and away from Glasgow--it was soon told
that Lady Eustace and her party were among them. A good deal had been
already heard of Lizzie, and it was at least known of her that she had,
for her life, the Portray estate in her hands. So there was an
undercurrent of whispering, and that sort of commotion which the
appearance of newcomers does produce at a hunt-meet. Lord George knew one
or two men, who were surprised to find him in Ayrshire, and Mrs. Carbuncle
was soon quite at home with a young nobleman whom she had met in the Vale
with the Baron. Sir Griffin did not leave Lucinda's side, and for a while
poor Lizzie felt herself alone in a crowd.

Who does not know that terrible feeling, and the all but necessity that
exists for the sufferer to pretend that he is not suffering--which again
is aggravated by the conviction that the pretence is utterly vain? This
may be bad with a man, but with a woman, who never looks to be alone in a
crowd, it is terrible. For five minutes, during which everybody else was
speaking to everybody--for five minutes, which seemed to her to be an
hour, Lizzie spoke to no one, and no one spoke to her. Was it for such
misery as this that she was spending hundreds upon hundreds, and running
herself into debt? For she was sure that there would be debt before she
parted with Mrs. Carbuncle. There are people, very many people, to whom an
act of hospitality is in itself a good thing; but there are others who are
always making calculations, and endeavouring to count up the thing
purchased against the cost. Lizzie had been told that she was a rich
woman--as women go, very rich. Surely she was entitled to entertain a few
friends; and if Mrs. Carbuncle and Miss Roanoke could hunt, it could not
be that hunting was beyond her own means. And yet she was spending a great
deal of money. She had seen a large wagon loaded with sacks of corn coming
up the hill to the Portray stables, and she knew that there would be a
long bill at the corn-chandler's. There had been found a supply of wine in
the cellars at Portray, which at her request had been inspected by her
cousin Frank; but it had been necessary, so he had told her, to have much
more sent down from London--champagne, and liqueurs, and other nice things
that cost money.

"You won't like not to have them if these people are coming?"

"Oh, no; certainly not," said Lizzie, with enthusiasm. What other rich
people did, she would do. But now, in her five minutes of misery, she
counted it all up, and was at a loss to find what was to be her return for
her expenditure. And then, if on this, her first day, she should have a
fall, with no tender hand to help her, and then find that she had knocked
out her front teeth!

But the cavalcade began to move, and then Lord George was by her side.
"You mustn't be angry if I seem to stick too close to you," he said. She
gave him her sweetest smile as she told him that that would be impossible.
"Because, you know, though it's the easiest thing in the world to get
along out hunting, and women never come to grief, a person is a little
astray at first."

"I shall be so much astray," said Lizzie. "I don't at all know how we are
going to begin. Are we hunting a fox now?" At this moment they were
trotting across a field or two, through a run of gates up to the first
covert.

"Not quite yet. The hounds haven't been put in yet. You see that wood
there? I suppose they'll draw that."

"What is drawing, Lord George? I want to know all about it, and I am so
ignorant. Nobody else will tell me." Then Lord George gave his lesson, and
explained the theory and system of foxhunting.

"We're to wait here, then, till the fox runs away? But it's ever so large,
and if he runs away, and nobody sees him? I hope he will, because it will
be nice to go on easily."

"A great many people hope that, and a great many think it nice to go on
easily. Only you must not confess to it." Then he went on with his
lecture, and explained the meaning of scent; was great on the difficulty
of getting away; described the iniquity of heading the fox; spoke of up
wind and down wind; got as far as the trouble of "carrying," and told her
that a good ear was everything in a big wood--when there came upon them
the thrice-repeated note of an old hound's voice, and the quick
scampering, and low, timid, anxious, trustful whinnying, of a dozen
comrade younger hounds, who recognised the sagacity of their well-known
and highly-appreciated elder.

"That's a fox," said Lord George.

"What shall I do now?" said Lizzie, all in a twitter.

"Sit just where you are, and light a cigar, if you're given to smoking."

"Pray don't joke with me. You know I want to do it properly."

"And therefore you must sit just where you are, and not gallop about.
There's a matter of a hundred and twenty acres here, I should say, and a
fox doesn't always choose to be evicted at the first notice. It's a chance
whether he goes at all from a wood like this. I like woods myself,
because, as you say, we can take it easy; but if you want to ride, you
should--By George, they've killed him."

"Killed the fox?"

"Yes; he's dead. Didn't you hear?"

"And is that a hunt?"

"Well--as far as it goes, it is."

"Why didn't he run away? What a stupid beast! I don't see so very much in
that. Who killed him? That man that was blowing the horn?"

"The hounds chopped him."

"Chopped him!" Lord George was very patient, and explained to Lizzie, who
was now indignant and disappointed, the misfortune of chopping. "And are
we to go home now? Is it all over?"

"They say the country is full of foxes," said Lord George. "Perhaps we
shall chop half a dozen."

"Dear me! Chop half a dozen foxes! Do they like to be chopped? I thought
they always ran away."

Lord George was constant and patient, and rode at Lizzie's side from
covert to covert. A second fox they did kill in the same fashion as the
first; a third they couldn't hunt a yard; a fourth got to ground after
five minutes, and was dug out ingloriously, during which process a
drizzling rain commenced.

"Where is the man with my waterproof?" demanded Mrs. Carbuncle. Lord
George had sent the man to see whether there was shelter to be had in a
neighbouring yard. And Mrs. Carbuncle was angry. "It's my own fault," she
said, "for not having my own man. Lucinda, you'll be wet."

"I don't mind the wet," said Lucinda. Lucinda never did mind anything.

"If you'll come with me, we'll get into a barn," said Sir Griffin.

"I like the wet," said Lucinda. All the while seven men were at work with
picks and shovels, and the master and four or five of the more ardent
sportsmen were deeply engaged in what seemed to be a mining operation on a
small scale. The huntsman stood over giving his orders. One enthusiastic
man, who had been lying on his belly, grovelling in the mud for five
minutes, with a long stick in his hand, was now applying the point of it
scientifically to his nose. An ordinary observer with a magnifying glass
might have seen a hair at the end of the stick.

"He's there," said the enthusiastic man, covered with mud, after a long-
drawn eager sniff at the stick. The huntsman deigned to give one glance.

"That's rabbit," said the huntsman. A conclave was immediately formed over
the one visible hair that stuck to the stick, and three experienced
farmers decided that it was rabbit. The muddy, enthusiastic man, silenced
but not convinced, retired from the crowd, leaving his stick behind him,
and comforted himself with his brandy-flask.

"He's here, my lord," said the huntsman to his noble master, "only we
ain't got nigh him yet." He spoke almost in a whisper, so that the
ignorant crowd should not hear the words of wisdom, which they wouldn't
understand, or perhaps believe. "It's that full of rabbits that the holes
is all hairs. They ain't got no terrier here, I suppose. They never has
aught that is wanted in these parts. Work round to the right, there--
that's his line." The men did work round to the right, and in something
under an hour the fox was dragged out by his brush and hind legs, while
the experienced whip who dragged him held the poor brute tight by the back
of his neck. "An old dog, my lord. There's such a many of 'em here, that
they'll be a deal better for a little killing." Then the hounds ate their
third fox for that day.

Lady Eustace, in the mean time, and Mrs. Carbuncle, with Lord George, had
found their way to the shelter of a cattle-shed. Lucinda had slowly
followed, and Sir Griffin had followed her. The gentlemen smoked cigars,
and the ladies, when they had eaten their luncheons and drunk their
sherry, were cold and cross.

"If this is hunting," said Lizzie, "I really don't think so much about
it."

"It's Scotch hunting," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I have seen foxes dug out south of the Tweed," suggested Lord George.

"I suppose everything is slow after the Baron," said Mrs. Carbuncle, who
had distinguished herself with the Baron's stag-hounds last March.

"Are we to go home now?" asked Lizzie, who would have been well pleased to
have received an answer in the affirmative.

"I presume they'll draw again," exclaimed Mrs. Carbuncle, with an angry
frown on her brow. "It's hardly two o'clock."

"They always draw till seven in Scotland," said Lord George.

"That's nonsense," said Mrs. Carbuncle. "It's dark at four."

"They have torches in Scotland," said Lord George.

"They have a great many things in Scotland that are very far from
agreeable," said Mrs. Carbuncle. "Lucinda, did you ever see three foxes
killed without five minutes' running, before? I never did."

"I've been out all day without finding at all," said Lucinda, who loved
the truth.

"And so have I," said Sir Griffin; "often. Don't you remember that day
when we went down from London to Bringher Wood, and they pretended to find
at half-past four? That's what I call a sell!"

"They're going on, Lady Eustace," said Lord George. "If you're not tired,
we might as well see it out." Lizzie was tired, but said that she was not,
and she did see it out. They found a fifth fox, but again there was no
scent. "Who the ---- is to hunt a fox with people scurrying about like
that?" said the huntsman very angrily, dashing forward at a couple of
riders. "The hounds is behind you, only you ain't a-looking. Some people
never do look." The two peccant riders, unfortunately, were Sir Griffin
and Lucinda.

The day was one of those from which all the men and woman return home
cross, and which induce some half-hearted folk to declare to themselves
that they never will hunt again. When the master decided a little after
three that he would draw no more, because there wasn't a yard of scent,
our party had nine or ten miles to ride back to their carriages. Lizzie
was very tired, and when Lord George took her from her horse could almost
have cried from fatigue. Mrs. Carbuncle was never fatigued, but she had
become damp--soaking wet through, as she herself said--during the four
minutes that the man was absent with her waterproof jacket, and could not
bring herself to forget the ill-usage she had suffered. Lucinda had become
absolutely dumb, and any observer would have fancied that the two
gentlemen had quarrelled with each other.

"You ought to go on the box now," said Sir Griffin, grumbling.

"When you're my age and I'm yours, I will," said Lord George, taking his
seat in the carriage. Then he appealed to Lizzie. "You'll let me smoke,
won't you?" She simply bowed her head. And so they went home--Lord George
smoking, and the ladies dumb. Lizzie, as she dressed for dinner, almost
cried with vexation and disappointment.

There was a little conversation up-stairs between Mrs. Carbuncle and
Lucinda, when they were free from the attendance of their joint maid. "It
seems to me," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "that you won't make up your mind about
anything."

"There is nothing to make up my mind about."

"I think there is--a great deal. Do you mean to take this man who is
dangling after you?"

"He isn't worth taking."

"Carruthers says that the property must come right, sooner or later. You
might do better, perhaps, but you won't trouble yourself. We can't go on
like this forever, you know."

"If you hated it as much as I do, you wouldn't want to go on."

"Why don't you talk to him? I don't think he's at all a bad fellow."

"I've nothing to say."

"He'll offer to-morrow, if you'll accept him."

"Don't let him do that, Aunt Jane. I couldn't say Yes. As for loving him--
oh, laws!"

"It won't do to go on like this, you know."

"I'm only eighteen; and it's my money, aunt."

"And how long will it last? If you can't accept him, refuse him, and let
somebody else come."

"It seems to me," said Lucinda, "that one is as bad as another. I'd a deal
sooner marry a shoemaker and help him to make him shoes."

"That's downright wickedness," said Mrs. Carbuncle. And then they went
down to dinner.




CHAPTER XXXVIII

NAPPIE'S GRAY HORSE


During the leisure of Tuesday our friends regained their good humour, and
on the Wednesday morning they again started for the hunting-field. Mrs.
Carbuncle, who probably felt that she had behaved ill about the groom and
in regard to Scotland, almost made an apology, and explained that a cold
shower always did make her cross. "My dear Lady Eustace, I hope I wasn't
very savage."

"My dear Mrs. Carbuncle, I hope I wasn't very stupid," said Lizzie with a
smile.

"My dear Lady Eustace, and my dear Mrs. Carbuncle, and my dear Miss
Roanoke, I hope I wasn't very selfish," said Lord George.

"I thought you were," said Sir Griffin.

"Yes, Griff; and so were you; but I succeeded."

"I am almost glad that I wasn't of the party," said Mr. Emilius, with that
musical foreign tone of his. "Miss Macnulty and I did not quarrel; did
we?"

"No, indeed," said Miss Macnulty, who had liked the society of Mr.
Emilius.

But on this morning there was an attraction for Lizzie which the Monday
had wanted. She was to meet her cousin, Frank Greystock. The journey was
long, and the horses had gone on over night. They went by railway to
Kilmarnock, and there a carriage from the inn had been ordered to meet
them. Lizzie, as she heard the order given, wondered whether she would
have to pay for that, or whether Lord George and Sir Griffin would take so
much off her shoulders. Young women generally pay for nothing; and it was
very hard that she, who was quite a young woman, should have to pay for
all. But she smiled, and accepted the proposition. "Oh, yes; of course a
carriage at the station. It is so nice to have some one to think of
things, like Lord George." The carriage met them, and everything went
prosperously. Almost the first person they saw was Frank Greystock, in a
black coat indeed, but riding a superb gray horse, and looking quite as
though he knew what he was about. He was introduced to Mrs. Carbuncle and
Miss Roanoke and Sir Griffin. With Lord George he had some slight previous
acquaintance.

"You've had no difficulty about a horse?" said Lizzie.

"Not the slightest. But I was in an awful fright this morning. I wrote to
MacFarlane from London, and absolutely hadn't a moment to go to his place
yesterday or this morning. I was staying over at Glenshiels, and had not a
moment to spare in catching the train. But I found a horse-box on, and a
lad from MacFarlane's just leaving as I came up."

"Didn't he send a boy down with the horse?" asked Lord George.

"I believe there is a boy, and the boy'll be awfully bothered. I told them
to book the horse for Kilmarnock."

"They always do book for Kilmarnock for this meet," said a gentleman who
had made acquaintance with some of Lizzie's party on the previous hunting-
day; "but Stewarton is ever so much nearer."

"So somebody told me in the carriage," continued Frank, "and I contrived
to get my box off at Stewarton. The guard was uncommon civil, and so was
the porter. But I hadn't a moment to look for the boy."

"I always make my fellow stick to his horses," said Sir Griffin.

"But you see, Sir Griffin, I haven't got a fellow, and I've only hired a
horse. But I shall hire a good many horses from Mr. MacFarlane if he'll
always put me up like this."

"I'm so glad you're here!" said Lizzie.

"So am I. I hunt about twice in three years, and no man likes it so much.
I've still got to find out whether the beast can jump."

"Any mortal thing alive, sir," said one of those horsey-looking men who
are to be found in all hunting-fields, who wear old brown breeches, old
black coats, old hunting-caps, who ride screws, and never get thrown out.

"You know him, do you?" said Frank.

"I know him. I didn't know as Muster MacFarlane owned him. No more he
don't," said the horsey man, turning aside to one of his friends. "That's
Nappie's horse, from Jamaica Street."

"Not possible," said the friend.

"You'll tell me I don't know my own horse next."

"I don't believe you ever owned one," said the friend.

Lizzie was in truth delighted to have her cousin beside her. He had, at
any rate, forgiven what she had said to him at his last visit, or he would
not have been there. And then, too, there was a feeling of reality in her
connection with him, which was sadly wanting to her, unreal as she was
herself, in her acquaintance with the other people around her. And on this
occasion three or four people spoke or bowed to her, who had only stared
at her before; and the huntsman took off his cap, and hoped that he would
do something better for her than on the previous Monday. And the huntsman
was very courteous also to Miss Roanoke, expressing the same hope, cap in
hand, and smiling graciously. A huntsman at the beginning of any day or at
the end of a good day is so different from a huntsman at the end of a bad
day! A huntsman often has a very bad time out hunting, and it is sometimes
a marvel that he does not take the advice which Job got from his wife. But
now all things were smiling, and it was soon known that his lordship
intended to draw Craigattan Gorse. Now in those parts there is no surer
find, and no better chance of a run, than Craigattan Gorse affords.

"There is one thing I want to ask, Mr. Greystock," said Lord George, in
Lizzie's hearing."

"You shall ask two," said Frank.

"Who is to coach Lady Eustace to-day, you or I?"

"Oh, do let me have somebody to coach me," said Lizzie.

"For devotion in coachmanship," said Frank--"devotion, that is, to my
cousin--I defy the world. In point of skill I yield to Lord George."

"My pretensions are precisely the same," said Lord George. "I glow with
devotion; my skill is naught."

"I like you best, Lord George," said Lizzie, laughing.

"That settles the question," said Lord George.

"Altogether," said Frank, taking off his hat.

"I mean as a coach," said Lizzie.

"I quite understand the extent of the preference," said Lord George.
Lizzie was delighted, and thought the game was worth the candle. The noble
master had told her that they were sure of a run from Craigattan, and she
wasn't in the least tired, and they were not called upon to stand still in
a big wood, and it didn't rain, and, in every respect, the day was very
different from Monday. Mounted on a bright-skinned, lively steed, with her
cousin on one side and Lord George de Bruce Carruthers on the other, with
all the hunting world of her own county civil around her, and a fox just
found in Craigattan Gorse, what could the heart of woman desire more? This
was to live. There was, however, just enough of fear to make the blood run
quickly to her heart.

"We'll be away at once now," said Lord George with utmost earnestness;
"follow me close, but not too close. When the men see that I am giving you
a lead, they won't come between. If you hang back, I'll not go ahead. Just
check your horse as he comes to his fences, and, if you can, see me over
before you go at them. Now then, down the hill; there's a gate at the
corner, and a bridge over the water. We couldn't be better. By George!
there they are, all together. If they don't pull him down in the first two
minutes, we shall have a run."

Lizzie understood most of it, more at least than would nine out of ten
young women who had never ridden a hunt before. She was to go wherever
Lord George led her, and she was to ride upon his heels. So much at least
she understood, and so much she was resolved to do. That dread about her
front teeth which had perplexed her on Monday was altogether gone now. She
would ride as fast as Lucinda Roanoke. That was her prevailing idea.
Lucinda, with Mrs. Carbuncle, Sir Griffin, and the ladies' groom, was at
the other side of the covert. Frank had been with his cousin and Lord
George, but had crept down the hill while the hounds were in the gorse. A
man who likes hunting, but hunts only once a year, is desirous of doing
the best he can with his day. When the hounds came out and crossed the
brook at the end of the gorse, perhaps he was a little too forward. But,
indeed, the state of affairs did not leave much time for waiting, or for
the etiquette of the hunting-field. Along the opposite margin of the brook
there ran a low paling, which made the water a rather nasty thing to face.
A circuit of thirty or forty yards gave the easy riding of a little
bridge, and to that all the crowd hurried. But one or two men with good
eyes, and hearts as good, had seen the leading hounds across the brook
turning up the hill away from the bridge, and knew that two most necessary
minutes might be lost in the crowd. Frank did as they did, having seen
nothing of any hounds, but with instinctive knowledge that they were men
likely to be right in a hunting-field. "If that ain't Nappie's horse, I'll
eat him," said one of the leading men to the other, as all the three were
breasting the hill together. Frank only knew that he had been carried over
water and timber without a mistake, and felt a glow of gratitude toward
Mr. MacFarlane. Up the hill they went, and, not waiting to inquire into
the circumstances of a little gate, jumped a four-foot wall and were away.
"How the mischief did he get atop of Nappie's horse?" said the horsey man
to his friend.

"We're about right for it now," said the huntsman, as he came up alongside
of Frank. He had crossed the bridge, but had been the first across it, and
knew how to get over his ground quickly. On they went, the horsey man
leading on his thoroughbred screw, the huntsman second, and Frank third.
The pace had already been too good for the other horsey man.

When Lord George and Lizzie had mounted the hill, there was a rush of
horses at the little gate. As they topped the hill Lucinda and Mrs.
Carbuncle were jumping the wall. Lord George looked back and asked a
question without a word. Lizzie answered it as mutely, Jump it! She was
already a little short of breath, but she was ready to jump anything that
Lucinda Roanoke had jumped. Over went Lord George, and she followed him
almost without losing the stride of her horse. Surely in all the world
there was nothing equal to this. There was a large grass field before
them, and for a moment she came up alongside of Lord George. "Just steady
him before he leaps," said Lord George. She nodded her assent, and smiled
her gratitude. She had plenty of breath for riding, but none for speaking.
They were now very near to Lucinda, and Sir Griffin, and Mrs. Carbuncle.
"The pace is too good for Mrs. Carbuncle's horse," said Lord George. Oh,
if she could only pass them, and get up to those men whom she saw before
her! She knew that one of them was her cousin Frank. She had no wish to
pass them, but she did wish that he should see her. In the next fence Lord
George spied a rail, which he thought safer than a blind hedge, and he
made for it. His horse took it well, and so did Lizzie's; but Lizzie
jumped it a little too near him, as he had paused an instant to look at
the ground.

"Indeed, I won't do it again," she said, collecting all her breath for an
apology.

"You are going admirably," he said, "and your horse is worth double the
money." She was so glad now that he had not spared for price in mounting
her! Looking to the right, she could see that Mrs. Carbuncle had only just
floundered through the hedge. Lucinda was still ahead, but Sir Griffin was
falling behind, as though divided in duty between the niece and the aunt.
Then they passed through a gate, and Lord George stayed his horse to hold
it for her. She tried to thank him but he stopped her. "Don't mind
talking, but come along, and take it easy." She smiled again, and he told
himself that she was wondrous pretty. And then her pluck was so good! And
then she had four thousand a year! "Now for the gap; don't be in a hurry.
You first, and I'll follow you to keep off these two men. Keep to the
left, where the other horses have been." On they went, and Lizzie was in
heaven. She could not quite understand her feelings, because it had come
to that with her that to save her life she could not have spoken a word.
And yet she was not only happy but comfortable. The leaping was
delightful, and her horse galloped with her as though his pleasure was as
great as her own. She thought that she was getting nearer to Lucinda. For
her, in her heart, Lucinda was the quarry. If she could only pass Lucinda!
That there were any hounds she had altogether forgotten. She only knew
that two or three men were leading the way, of whom her cousin Frank was
one, that Lucinda Roanoke was following them closely, and that she was
gaining upon Lucinda Roanoke. She knew she was gaining a little, because
she could see now how well and squarely Lucinda sat upon her horse. As for
herself, she feared that she was rolling; but she need not have feared.
She was so small, and lithe, and light, that her body adapted itself
naturally to the pace of her horse. Lucinda was of a different build, and
it behooved her to make for herself a perfect seat. "We must have the
wall," said Lord George, who was again at her side for a moment. She would
have "had" a castle wall, moat included, turrets and all, if he would only
have shown her the way. The huntsman and Frank had taken the wall. The
horsey man's bit of blood, knowing his own powers to an inch, had
declined--not roughly, with a sudden stop and a jerk, but with a swerve to
the left which the horsey man at once understood. What the brute lacked in
jumping he could make up in pace, and the horsey man was along the wall
and over a broken bank at the head of it, with the loss of not more than a
minute. Lucinda's horse, following the ill example, balked the jump. She
turned him round with a savage gleam in her eye which Lizzie was just near
enough to see, struck him rapidly over the shoulders with her whip, and
the animal flew with her into the next field. "Oh, if I could do it like
that," thought Lizzie. But in that very minute she was doing it, not only
as well but better. Not following Lord George, but close at his side, the
little animal changed his pace, trotted for a yard or two, hopped up as
though the wall were nothing, knocked off a top stone with his hind feet,
and dropped on the ground so softly that Lizzie hardly believed that she
had gone over the big obstruction that had cost Lucinda such an effort.
Lucinda's horse came down on all four legs, with a grunt and a groan, and
she knew that she had bustled him. At that moment Lucinda was very full of
wrath against the horsey man with the screw who had been in her way. "He
touched it," gasped Lizzie, thinking that her horse had disgraced himself.

"He's worth his weight in gold," said Lord George. "Come along. There's a
brook with a ford. Morgan is in it." Morgan was the huntsman. "Don't let
them get before you." Oh, no. She would let no one get before her. She did
her very best, and just got her horse's nose on the broken track leading
down into the brook before Lucinda.

"Pretty good, isn't it?" said Lucinda. Lizzie smiled sweetly. She could
smile, though she could not speak.

"Only they do balk one so at one's fences," said Lucinda. The horsey man
had all but regained his place, and was immediately behind Lucinda, within
hearing, as Lucinda knew.

On the further side of the field, beyond the brook, there was a little
spinny, and for half a minute the hounds came to a check. "Give 'em time,
sir, give 'em time," said Morgan to Frank, speaking in full good humour,
with no touch of Monday's savagery. "Wind him, Bolton; Beaver's got it.
Very good thing, my lady, isn't it? Now, Carstairs, if you're a--going to
'unt the fox you'd better 'unt him." Carstairs was the horsey man, and one
with whom Morgan very often quarrelled. "That's it, my hearties," and
Morgan was across a broken wall in a moment, after the leading hounds.

"Are we to go on?" said Lizzie, who feared much that Lucinda would get
ahead of her. There was a matter of three dozen horsemen up now, and, as
far as Lizzie saw, the whole thing might have to be done again. In
hunting, to have ridden is the pleasure; and not simply to have ridden
well, but to have ridden better than others.

"I call it very awkward ground," said Mrs. Carbuncle, coming up. "It can't
be compared to the Baron's country."

"Stone walls four feet and a half high, and well built, are awkward," said
the noble master.

But the hounds were away again, and Lizzie had got across the gap before
Lucinda, who, indeed, made way for her hostess with a haughty politeness
which was not lost upon Lizzie. Lizzie could not stop to beg pardon, but
she would remember to do it in her prettiest way on their journey home.
They were now on a track of open country, and the pace was quicker even
than before. The same three men were still leading, Morgan, Greystock, and
Carstairs. Carstairs had slightly the best of it; and of course Morgan
swore afterwards that he was among the hounds the whole run. "The scent
was that good there wasn't no putting of 'em off; no thanks to him," said
Morgan. "I 'ate to see 'em galloping, galloping, galloping, with no more
eye to the 'ounds than a pig. Any idiot can gallop if he's got it under
'im." All which only signified that Jack Morgan didn't like to see any of
his field before him. There was need, indeed, now for galloping, and it
may be doubted whether Morgan himself was not doing his best. There were
about five or six in the second fight, and among these Lord George and
Lizzie were well placed. But Lucinda had pressed again ahead.

"Miss Roanoke had better have a care or she'll blow her horse," Lord
George said. Lizzie didn't mind what happened to Miss Roanoke's horse so
that it could be made to go a little slower and fall behind. But Lucinda
still pressed on, and her animal went with a longer stride than Lizzie's
horse.

They now crossed a road, descending a hill, and were again in a close
country. A few low hedges seemed as nothing to Lizzie. She could see her
cousin gallop over them ahead of her, as though they were nothing; and her
own horse, as he came to them, seemed to do exactly the same. On a sudden
they found themselves abreast with the huntsman.

"There's a biggish brook below there, my lord," said he. Lizzie was
charmed to hear it. Hitherto she had jumped all the big things so easily,
that it was a pleasure to hear of them.

"How are we to manage it?" asked Lord George.

"It is ridable, my lord; but there's a place about half a mile down. Let's
see how'll they head. Drat it, my lord, they've turned up, and we must
have it or go back to the road." Morgan hurried on, showing that he meant
to "have" it, as did also Lucinda.

"Shall we go to the road?" said Lord George.

"No, no!" said Lizzie.

Lord George looked at her and at her horse, and then galloped after the
huntsman and Lucinda. The horsey man with the well-bred screw was first
over the brook. The little animal could take almost any amount of water,
and his rider knew the spot. "He'll do it like a bird," he had said to
Greystock, and Greystock had followed him. Mr. MacFarlane's hired horse
did do it like a bird.

"I know him, sir," said Carstairs. "Mr. Nappie gave £250 for him down in
Northamptonshire last February; bought him of Mr. Percival. You know Mr.
Percival, sir?" Frank knew neither Mr. Percival nor Mr. Nappie, and at
this moment cared nothing for either of them. To him, at this moment, Mr.
MacFarlane, of Buchanan Street, Glasgow, was the best friend he ever had.

Morgan, knowing well the horse he rode, dropped him into the brook,
floundered and half swam through the mud and water, and scrambled out
safely on the other side. "He wouldn't have jumped it with me, if I'd
asked him ever so," he said afterwards. Lucinda rode at it, straight as an
arrow, but her brute came to a dead balk, and, but that she sat well,
would have thrown her into the stream. Lord George let Lizzie take the
leap before he took it, knowing that, if there were misfortune, he might
so best render help. To Lizzie it seemed as though the river were the
blackest, and the deepest, and the broadest that ever ran. For a moment
her heart quailed; but it was but for a moment. She shut her eyes, and
gave the little horse his head. For a moment she thought that she was in
the water. Her horse was almost upright on the bank, with his hind feet
down among the broken ground, and she was clinging to his neck. But she
was light, and the beast made good his footing, and then she knew that she
had done it. In that moment of the scramble her heart had been so near her
mouth that she was almost choked. When she looked round Lord George was
already by her side.

"You hardly gave him powder enough," he said, "but still he did it
beautifully. Good heavens! Miss Roanoke is in the river." Lizzie looked
back, and there, in truth, was Lucinda struggling with her horse in the
water. They paused a moment, and then there were three or four men
assisting her. "Come on," said Lord George. "There are plenty to take her
out, and we couldn't get to her if we stayed."

"I ought to stop," said Lizzie.

"You couldn't get back if you gave your eyes for it," said Lord George.
"She's all right." So instigated, Lizzie followed her leader up the hill,
and in a minute was close upon Morgan's heels.

The worst of doing a big thing out hunting is the fact that in nine cases
out of ten they who don't do it are as well off as they who do. If there
were any penalty for riding round, or any mark given to those who had
ridden straight, so that justice might in some sort be done, it would
perhaps be better. When you have nearly broken your neck to get to hounds,
or made your horse exert himself beyond his proper power, and then find
yourself, within three minutes, overtaking the hindmost ruck of horsemen
on a road because of some iniquitous turn that the fox had taken, the
feeling is not pleasant. And some man who has not ridden at all, who never
did ride at all, will ask you where you have been; and his smile will give
you the lie in your teeth, if you make any attempt to explain the facts.
Let it be sufficient for you at such a moment to feel that you are not
ashamed of yourself. Self-respect will support a man even in such misery
as this.

The fox on this occasion, having crossed the river, had not left its bank,
but had turned from his course up the stream, so that the leading spirits
who had followed the hounds over the water came upon a crowd of riders on
the road in a space something short of a mile. Mrs. Carbuncle, among
others, was there, and had heard of Lucinda's mishap. She said a word to
Lord George in anger, and Lord George answered her. "We were over the
river before it happened, and if we had given our eyes we couldn't have
got to her. Don't you make a fool of yourself!" The last words were spoken
in a whisper, but Lizzie's sharp ears caught them.

"I was obliged to do what I was told," said Lizzie apologetically.

"It will be all right, dear Lady Eustace. Sir Griffin is with her. I am so
glad you are going so well."

They were off again now, and the stupid fox absolutely went back across
the river. But, whether on one side or on the other, his struggle for life
was now in vain. Two years of happy, free existence amid the wilds of
Craigattan had been allowed him. Twice previously had he been "found," and
the kindly storm or not less beneficent brightness of the sun had enabled
him to baffle his pursuers. Now there had come one glorious day, and the
common lot of mortals must be his. A little spurt there was, back towards
his own home, just enough to give something of selectness to the few who
saw him fall, and then he fell. Among the few were Frank and Lord George
and our Lizzie. Morgan was there, of course, and one of his whips. Of
Ayrshire folk, perhaps five or six, and among them our friend Mr.
Carstairs. They had run him down close to the outbuildings of a farmyard,
and they broke him up in the home paddock.

"What do you think of hunting?" said Frank to his cousin.

"It's divine."

"My cousin went pretty well, I think," he said to Lord George.

"Like a celestial bird of paradise. No one ever went better--or I believe
so well. You've been carried rather nicely yourself."

"Indeed I have," said Frank, patting his still palpitating horse, "and
he's not to say tired now."

"You've taken it pretty well out of him, sir," said Carstairs. "There was
a little bit of hill that told when we got over the brook. I know'd you'd
find he'd jump a bit."

"I wonder whether he's to be bought?" asked Frank in his enthusiasm.

"I don't know the horse that isn't," said Mr. Carstairs, "so long as you
don't stand at the figure."

They were collected on the farm road, and now, as they were speaking,
there was a commotion among the horses. A man driving a little buggy was
forcing his way along the road, and there was a sound of voices, as though
the man in the buggy were angry. And he was angry. Frank, who was on foot
by his horse's head, could see that the man was dressed for hunting, with
a bright red coat and a flat hat, and that he was driving the pony with a
hunting-whip. The man was talking as he approached, but what he said did
not much matter to Frank, till his new friend, Mr. Carstairs, whispered a
word in his ear. "It's Nappie, by Gum!" Then there crept across Frank's
mind an idea that there might be trouble coming.

"There he is," said Nappie, bringing his pony to a dead stop with a chuck,
and jumping out of the buggy. "I say you, sir; you've stole my 'orse."
Frank said not a word, but stood his ground with his hand on the nag's
bridle. "You've stole my 'orse; you've stole him off the rail. And you've
been a-riding him all day. Yes, you 'ave. Did ever anybody see the like of
this? Why, the poor beast can a'most stand."

"I got him from Mr. MacFarlane."

"MacFarlane be blowed. You didn't do nothing of the kind. You stole him
off the rail at Stewarton. Yes, you did; and him booked to Kilmarnock.
Where's a police? Who's to stand the like o' this? I say, my lord, just
look at this." A crowd had now been formed round poor Frank, and the
master had come up. Mr. Nappie was a Huddersfield man, who had come to
Glasgow in the course of the last winter, and whose popularity in the
hunting-field was not as yet quite so great as perhaps it might have been.

"There's been a mistake, I suppose," said the master.

"Mistake, my lord! Take a man's 'orse off the rail at Stewarton, and him
booked for Kilmarnock, and ride him to a standstill! It's no mistake at
all. It's 'orse-nobbling; that's what it is. Is there any police here,
sir?" This he said, turning round to a farmer. The farmer didn't deign any
reply. "Perhaps you'll tell me your name, sir? if you've got a name. No
gen'leman ever took a gen'leman's 'orse off the rail like that."

"Oh, Frank, do come away," said Lizzie who was standing by.

"We shall be all right in two minutes," said Frank.

"No we sha'n't," said Mr. Nappie, "nor yet in two hours. I've asked what's
your name?"

"My name is--Greystock."

"Greystockings," said Mr. Nappie more angrily than ever. "I don't believe
in no such name. Where do you live?" Then somebody whispered a word to
him. "Member of Parliament--is he? I don't care a----. A member of
Parliament isn't to steal my 'orse off the rail, and him booked to
Kilmarnock. Now, my lord, what'd you do if you was served like that?" This
was another appeal to the noble master.

"I should express a hope that my horse had carried the gentleman as he
liked to be carried," said the master.

"And he has--carried me remarkably well," said Frank; whereupon there was
a loud laugh among the crowd.

"I wish he'd broken the infernal neck of you, you scoundrel, you; that's
what I do," said Mr. Nappie. "There was my man, and my 'orse, and myself,
all booked from Glasgow to Kilmarnock; and when I got there what did the
guard say to me? why, just that a man in a black coat had taken my horse
off at Stewarton; and now I've been driving all about the country in that
gig there for three hours!" When Mr. Nappie had got so far as this in his
explanation he was almost in tears. "I'll make 'im pay, that I will. Take
your hand off my horse's bridle, sir. Is there any gentleman here as would
like to give two hundred and eighty guineas for a horse, and then have him
rid to a standstill by a fellow like that down from London? If you're in
Parliament, why don't you stick to Parliament? I don't suppose he's worth
fifty pound this moment."

Frank had all the while been endeavouring to explain the accident; how he
had ordered a horse from Mr. MacFarlane, and the rest of it--as the reader
will understand; but quite in vain. Mr. Nappie in his wrath would not hear
a word. But now that he spoke about money Frank thought that he saw an
opening.

"Mr. Nappie," he said, "I'll buy the horse for the price you gave for
him."

"I'll see you--extremely well--first," said Mr. Nappie.

The horse had now been surrendered to Mr. Nappie, and Frank suggested that
he might as well return to Kilmarnock in the gig, and pay for the hire of
it. But Mr. Nappie would not allow him to set a foot upon the gig. "It's
my gig for the day," said he, "and you don't touch it. You shall foot it
all the way back to Kilmarnock, Mr. Greystockings." But Mr. Nappie, in
making this threat, forgot that there were gentlemen there with second
horses. Frank was soon mounted on one belonging to Lord George, and Lord
George's servant, at the corner of the farm-yard, got into the buggy, and
was driven back to Kilmarnock by the man who had accompanied poor Mr.
Nappie in their morning's hunt on wheels after the hounds.

"Upon my word, I was very sorry," said Frank as he rode back with his
friends to Kilmarnock; "and when I first really understood what had
happened, I would have done anything. But what could I say? It was
impossible not to laugh, he was so unreasonable."

"I should have put my whip over his shoulder," said a stout farmer,
meaning to be civil to Frank Greystock.

"Not after using it so often over his horse," said Lord George.

"I never had to touch him once," said Frank.

"And are you to have it all for nothing?" asked the thoughtful Lizzie.

"He'll send a bill in, you'll find," said a bystander.

"Not he," said Lord George. "His grievance is worth more to him than his
money."

No bill did come to Frank, and he got his mount for nothing. When Mr.
MacFarlane was applied to, he declared that no letter ordering a horse had
been delivered in his establishment. From that day to this Mr. Nappie's
gray horse has had a great character in Ayrshire; but all the world there
says that its owner never rides him as Frank Greystock rode him that day.




CHAPTER XXXIX

SIR GRIFFIN TAKES AN UNFAIR ADVANTAGE


We must return to the unfortunate Lucinda, whom we last saw struggling
with her steed in the black waters of the brook which she attempted to
jump. A couple of men were soon in after her, and she was rescued and
brought back to the side from which she had been taken off without any
great difficulty. She was neither hurt nor frightened, but she was wet
through; and for a while she was very unhappy, because it was not found
quite easy to extricate her horse. During the ten minutes of her agony,
while the poor brute was floundering in the mud, she had been quite
disregardful of herself, and had almost seemed to think that Sir Griffin,
who was with her, should go into the water after her steed. But there were
already two men in the water and three on the bank, and Sir Griffin
thought that duty required him to stay by the young lady's side. "I don't
care a bit about myself," said Lucinda, "but if anything can be done for
poor Warrior?" Sir Griffin assured her that "poor Warrior" was receiving
the very best attention; and then he pressed upon her the dangerous
condition in which she herself was standing, quite wet through, covered as
to her feet and legs with mud, growing colder and colder every minute. She
touched her lips with a little brandy that somebody gave her, and then
declared again that she cared for nothing but poor Warrior. At last poor
Warrior was on his legs, with the water dripping from his black flanks,
with his nose stained with mud, with one of his legs a little cut, and
alas! with the saddle wet through. Nevertheless, there was nothing to be
done better than to ride into Kilmarnock. The whole party must return to
Kilmarnock, and, perhaps, if they hurried, she might be able to get her
clothes dry before they would start by the train. Sir Griffin, of course,
accompanied her, and they two rode into the town alone. Mrs. Carbuncle did
hear of the accident soon after the occurrence, but had not seen her
niece; nor when she heard of it, could she have joined Lucinda.

If anything would make a girl talk to a man, such a ducking as Lucinda had
had would do so. Such sudden events, when they come in the shape of
misfortune, or the reverse, generally have the effect of abolishing
shyness for the time. Let a girl be upset with you in a railway train, and
she will talk like a Rosalind, though before the accident she was as mute
as death. But with Lucinda Roanoke the accustomed change did not seem to
take place. When Sir Griffin had placed her on her sad lie, she would have
trotted all--the way into Kilmarnock without a word if he would have
allowed her. But he, at least, understood that such a joint misfortune
should create confidence, for he, too, had lost the run, and he did not
intend to lose his opportunity also. "I am so glad that I was near you,"
he said.

"Oh, thank you, yes; it would have been bad to be alone."

"I mean that I am glad that it was I," said Sir Griffin. "It's very hard
even to get a moment to speak to you." They were now trotting along on the
road, and there was still three miles before them.

"I don't know," said she. "I'm always with the other people."

"Just so." And then he paused. "But I want to find you when you're not
with the other people. Perhaps, however, you don't like me."

As he paused for a reply, she felt herself bound to say something. "Oh,
yes, I do," she said, "as well as anybody else."

"And is that all?"

"I suppose so."

After that he rode on for the best part of another mile before he spoke to
her again. He had made up his mind that he would do it. He hardly knew why
it was that he wanted her. He had not determined that he was desirous of
the charms or comfort of domestic life. He had not even thought where he
would live were he married. He had not suggested to himself that Lucinda
was a desirable companion, that her temper would suit his, that her ways
and his were sympathetic, or that she would be a good mother to the future
Sir Griffin Tewett. He had seen that she was a very handsome girl, and
therefore he had thought that he would like to possess her. Had she fallen
like a ripe plum into his mouth, or shown herself ready so to fall, he
would probably have closed his lips and backed out of the affair. But the
difficulty no doubt added something to the desire. "I had hoped," he said,
"that after knowing each other so long there might have been more than
that."

She was again driven to speak because he paused. "I don't know that that
makes much difference."

"Miss Roanoke, you can't but understand what I mean."

"I'm sure I don't," said she.

"Then I'll speak plainer."

"Not now, Sir Griffin, because I'm so wet."

"You can listen to me even if you will not answer me. I am sure that you
know that I love you better than all the world. Will you be mine?" Then he
moved on a little forward so that he might look back into her face. "Will
you allow me to think of you as my future wife?"

Miss Roanoke was able to ride at a stone wall or at a river, and to ride
at either the second time when her horse balked the first. Her heart was
big enough to enable her to give Sir Griffin an answer. Perhaps it was
that, in regard to the river and the stone wall, she knew what she wanted;
but that, as to Sir Griffin, she did not. "I don't think this is a proper
time to ask," she said.

"Why not?"

"Because I am wet through and cold. It is taking an unfair advantage."

"I didn't mean to take any unfair advantage," said Sir Griffin scowling;
"I thought we were alone----"

"Oh, Sir Griffin, I am so tired!" As they were now entering Kilmarnock, it
was quite clear that he could press her no further. They clattered up,
therefore, to the hotel, and he busied himself in getting a bedroom fire
lighted, and in obtaining the services of the landlady. A cup of tea was
ordered, and toast, and in two minutes Lucinda Roanoke was relieved from
the presence of the baronet.

"It's a kind of thing a fellow doesn't quite understand," said Sir Griffin
to himself. "Of course she means it, and why the devil can't she say so?"
He had no idea of giving up the chase, but he thought that perhaps he
would take it out of her when she became Lady Tewett.

They were an hour at the inn before Mrs. Carbuncle and Lady Eustace
arrived, and during that hour Sir Griffin did not see Miss Roanoke. For
this there was, of course, ample reason. Under the custody of the
landlady, Miss Roanoke was being made dry and clean, and was by no means
in a condition to receive a lover's vows. The baronet sent up half a dozen
messages as he sauntered about the yard of the inn, but he got no message
in return. Lucinda, as she sat drinking her tea and drying her clothes,
did no doubt think about him, but she thought about him as little as she
could. Of course he would come again, and she could make up her mind then.
It was no doubt necessary that she should do something. Her fortune, such
as it was, would soon be spent in the adventure of finding a husband. She
also had her ideas about love, and had enough of sincerity about her to
love a man thoroughly; but it had seemed to her that all the men who came
near her were men whom she could not fail to dislike. She was hurried here
and hurried there, and knew nothing of real social intimacies. As she told
her aunt in her wickedness, she would almost have preferred a shoemaker,
if she could have become acquainted with a shoemaker in a manner that
should be unforced and genuine. There was a savageness of antipathy in her
to the mode of life which her circumstances had produced for her. It was
that very savageness which made her ride so hard, and which forbade her to
smile and be pleasant to people whom she could not like. And yet she knew
that something must be done. She could not afford to wait as other girls
might do. Why not Sir Griffin as well as any other fool? It may be doubted
whether she knew how obstinate, how hard, how cruel to a woman a fool can
be.

Her stockings had been washed and dried, and her boots and trousers were
nearly dry, when Mrs. Carbuncle, followed by Lizzie, rushed into the room.
"Oh, my darling, how are you?" said the aunt, seizing her niece in her
arms.

"I'm only dirty now," said Lucinda.

"We've got off the biggest of the muck, my lady," said the landlady.

"Oh, Miss Roanoke," said Lizzie, "I hope you don't think I behaved badly
in going on."

"Everybody always goes on, of course," said Lucinda.

"I did so pray Lord George to let me try and jump back to you. We were
over, you know, before it happened. But he said it was quite impossible.
We did wait till we saw you were out."

"It didn't signify at all, Lady Eustace."

"And I was so sorry when I went through the wall at the corner of the wood
before you. But I was so excited I hardly knew what I was doing." Lucinda,
who was quite used to these affairs in the hunting-field, simply nodded
her acceptance of this apology. "But it was a glorious run, wasn't it?"

"Pretty well," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Oh, it was glorious; but then I got over the river. And, oh, if you had
been there afterwards. There was such an adventure between a man in a gig
and my cousin Frank." Then they all went to the train, and were carried
home to Portray.




CHAPTER XL

YOU ARE NOT ANGRY


On their journey back to Portray, the ladies were almost too tired for
talking, and Sir Griffin was sulky. Sir Griffin had as yet heard nothing
about Greystock's adventure, and did not care to be told. But when once
they were at the castle, and had taken warm baths and glasses of sherry,
and got themselves dressed and had come down to dinner, they were all very
happy. To Lizzie it had certainly been the most triumphant day of her
life. Her marriage with Sir Florian had been triumphant, but that was only
a step to something good that was to come after. She then had at her own
disposal her little wits and her prettiness, and a world before her in
which, as it then seemed to her, there was a deal of pleasure if she could
only reach it. Up to this period of her career she had hardly reached any
pleasure; but this day had been very pleasant. Lord George de Bruce
Carruthers had in truth been her Corsair, and she had found the thing
which she liked to do, and would soon know how to do. How glorious it was
to jump over that black, yawning stream, and then to see Lucinda fall into
it! And she could remember every jump, and her feeling of ecstasy as she
landed on the right side. And she had by heart every kind word that Lord
George had said to her--and she loved the sweet, pleasant, Corsair--like
intimacy that had sprung up between them. She wondered whether Frank was
at all jealous. It wouldn't be amiss that he should be a little jealous.
And then somebody had brought home in his pocket the fox's brush, which
the master of the hounds had told the huntsman to give her. It was all
delightful; and so much more delightful because Mrs. Carbuncle had not
gone quite so well as she liked to go, and because Lucinda had fallen into
the water.

They did not dine till past eight, and the ladies and gentlemen all left
the room together. Coffee and liqueurs were to be brought into the
drawing-room, and they were all to be intimate, comfortable, and at their
ease; all except Sir Griffin Tewett, who was still very sulky.

"Did he say anything?" Mrs. Carbuncle had asked.

"Yes."

"Well."

"He proposed; but of course I could not answer him when I was wet
through." There had been but a moment, and in that moment this was all
that Lucinda would say.

"Now I don't mean to stir again," said Lizzie, throwing herself into a
corner of a sofa, "till somebody carries me to bed. I never was so tired
in all my life." She was tired, but there is a fatigue which is delightful
as long as all the surroundings are pleasant and comfortable.

"I didn't call it a very hard day," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"You only killed one fox," said Mr. Mealyus, pretending a delightfully
clerical ignorance, "and on Monday you killed four. Why should you be
tired?"

"I suppose it was nearly twenty miles," said Frank, who was also ignorant.

"About ten, perhaps," said Lord George. "It was an hour and forty minutes,
and there was a good bit of slow hunting after we had come back over the
river."

"I'm sure it was thirty," said Lizzie, forgetting her fatigue in her
energy.

"Ten is always better than twenty," said Lord George, "and five generally
better than ten."

"It was just whatever is best," said Lizzie. "I know Frank's friend, Mr.
Nappie, said it was twenty. By-the-by, oughtn't we to have asked Mr.
Nappie home to dinner?"

"I thought so," said Frank; "but I couldn't take the liberty myself."

"I really think poor Mr. Nappie was very badly used," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Of course he was," said Lord George; "no man ever worse since hunting was
invented. He was entitled to a dozen dinners and no end of patronage; but
you see he took it out in calling your cousin Mr. Greystockings."

"I felt that blow," said Frank.

"I shall always call you Cousin Greystockings," said Lizzie.

"It was hard," continued Lord George, "and I understood it all so well
when he got into a mess in his wrath about booking the horse to
Kilmarnock. If the horse had been on the roadside, he or his men could
have protected him. He is put under the protection of a whole railway
company, and the company gives him up to the first fellow that comes and
asks for him."

"It was cruel," said Frank.

"If it had happened to me, I should have been very angry," said Mrs.
Carbuncle.

"But Frank wouldn't have had a horse at all," said Lizzie, "unless he had
taken Mr. Nappie's."

Lord George still continued his plea for Mr. Nappie. "There's something in
that certainly; but, still, I agree with Mrs. Carbuncle. If it had
happened to me, I should--just have committed murder and suicide. I can't
conceive anything so terrible. It's all very well for your noble master to
talk of being civil, and hoping that the horse had carried him well, and
all that. There are circumstances in which a man can't be civil. And then
everybody laughed at him! It's the way of the world. The lower you fall,
the more you're kicked."

"What can I do for him?" asked Frank.

"Put him down at your club and order thirty dozen of gray shirtings from
Nappie & Co., without naming the price."

"He'd send you gray stockings instead," said Lizzie.

But though Lizzie was in heaven, it behooved her to be careful. The
Corsair was a very fine specimen of the Corsair breed, about the best
Corsair she had ever seen, and had been devoted to her for the day. But
these Corsairs are known to be dangerous, and it would not be wise that
she should sacrifice any future prospect of importance on behalf of a
feeling, which, no doubt, was founded on poetry, but which might too
probably have no possible beneficial result. As far as she knew, the
Corsair had not even an island of his own in the Aegean Sea. And, if he
had, might not the island too probably have a Medora or two of its own? In
a ride across the country the Corsair was all that a Corsair should be;
but knowing, as she did, but very little of the Corsair, she could not
afford to throw over her cousin for his sake. As she was leaving the
drawing-room she managed to say one word to her cousin. "You were not
angry with me because I got Lord George to ride with me instead of you?"

"Angry with you?"

"I knew I should only be a hindrance to you."

"It was a matter of course. He knows all about it, and I know nothing. I
am very glad that you liked it so much."

"I did like it; and so did you. I was so glad you got that poor man's
horse. You were not angry then?" They had now passed across the hall, and
were on the bottom stair.

"Certainly not."

"And you are not angry for what happened before?" She did not look into
his face as she asked this question, but stood with her eyes fixed on the
stair-carpet.

"Indeed no."

"Good night, Frank."

"Good night, Lizzie." Then she went, and he returned to a room below which
had been prepared for purposes of tobacco and soda-water and brandy.

"Why, Griff, you're rather out of sorts to-night," said Lord George to his
friend, before Frank had joined them.

"So would you be out of sorts if you'd lost your run and had to pick a
young woman out of the water. I don't like young women when they're damp
and smell of mud."

"You mean to marry her, I suppose."

"How would you like me to ask you questions? Do you mean to marry the
widow? And, if you do, what'll Mrs. Carbuncle say? And if you don't, what
do you mean to do; and all the rest of it?"

"As for marrying the widow, I should like to know the facts first. As to
Mrs. C., she wouldn't object in the least. I generally have my horses so
bitted that they can't very well object. And as to the other question, I
mean to stay here for the next fortnight, and I advise you to make it
square with Miss Roanoke. Here's my lady's cousin; for a man who doesn't
ride often, he went very well to-day."

"I wonder if he'd take a twenty-pound note if I sent it to him," said
Frank, when they broke up for the night. "I don't like the idea of riding
such a fellow's horse for nothing."

"He'll bring an action against the railway, and then you can offer to pay
if you like." Mr. Nappie did bring an action against the railway, claiming
exorbitant damages; but with what result, we need not trouble ourselves to
inquire.




CHAPTER XLI

LIKEWISE THE BEARS IN COUPLES AGREE


Frank Greystock stayed till the following Monday at Portray, but could not
be induced to hunt on the Saturday, on which day the other sporting men
and women went to the meet. He could not, he said, trust to that traitor
MacFarlane, and he feared that his friend Mr. Nappie would not give him
another mount on the grey horse. Lizzie offered him one of her two
darlings, an offer which he, of course, refused; and Lord George also
proposed to put him up. But Frank averred that he had ridden his hunt for
that season, and would not jeopardise the laurels he had gained. "And
moreover," said he, "I should not dare to meet Mr. Nappie in the field."
So he remained at the castle and took a walk with Mr. Mealyus. Mr. Mealyus
asked a good many questions about Portray, and exhibited the warmest
sympathy with Lizzie's widowed condition. He called her a "sweet, gay,
unsophisticated, light-hearted young thing."

"She is very young," replied her cousin. "Yes," he continued, in answer to
further questions; "Portray is certainly very nice. I don't know what the
income is. Well, yes. I should think it is over a thousand. Eight! No, I
never heard it said that it was as much as that." When Mr. Mealyus put it
down in his mind as five, he was not void of acuteness, as very little
information had been given to him.

There was a joke throughout the castle that Mr. Mealyus had fallen in love
with Miss Macnulty. They had been a great deal together on those hunting
days; and Miss Macnulty was unusually enthusiastic in praise of his manner
and conversation. To her, also, had been addressed questions as to Portray
and its income, all of which she had answered to the best of her ability;
not intending to betray any secret, for she had no secret to betray; but
giving ordinary information on that commonest of all subjects, our
friends' incomes. Then there had risen a question whether there was a
vacancy for such promotion to Miss Macnulty. Mrs. Carbuncle had certainly
heard that there was a Mrs. Emilius. Lucinda was sure that there was not,
an assurance which might have been derived from a certain eagerness in the
reverend gentleman's demeanour to herself on a former occasion. To Lizzie,
who at present was very good-natured, the idea of Miss Macnulty having a
lover, whether he were a married man or not, was very delightful. "I'm
sure I don't know what you mean," said Miss Macnulty. "I don't suppose Mr.
Emilius had any idea of the kind." Upon the whole, however, Miss Macnulty
liked it.

On the Saturday nothing especial happened. Mr. Nappie was out on his gray
horse, and condescended to a little conversation with Lord George. He
wouldn't have minded, he said, if Mr. Greystock had come forward; but he
did think Mr. Greystock hadn't come forward as he ought to have done. Lord
George professed that he had observed the same thing; but then, as he
whispered into Mr. Nappie's ear, Mr. Greystock was particularly known as a
bashful man. "He didn't ride my 'orse anyway bashful," said Mr. Nappie--
all of which was told at dinner in the evening amidst a great deal of
laughter. There had been nothing special in the way of sport, and Lizzie's
enthusiasm for hunting, though still high, had gone down a few degrees
below fever heat. Lord George had again coached her; but there had been no
great need for coaching, no losing of her breath, no cutting down of
Lucinda, no river, no big wall--nothing, in short, very fast. They had
been much in a big wood; but 'Lizzie, in giving an account of the day to
her cousin, had acknowledged that she had not quite understood what they
were doing at any time.

"It was a-blowing of horns and a-galloping up and down all the day," she
said; "and then Morgan got cross again and scolded all the people. But
there was one nice paling, and Dandy flew over it beautifully. Two men
tumbled down, and one of them was a good deal hurt. It was very jolly--but
not at all like Wednesday."

Nor had it been like Wednesday to Lucinda Roanoke, who did not fall into
the water, and who did accept Sir Griffin when he again proposed to her in
Sarkie Wood. A great deal had been said to Lucinda on the Thursday and the
Friday by Mrs. Carbuncle--which had not been taken at all in good part by
Lucinda. On those days Lucinda kept as much as she could out of Sir
Griffin's way, and almost snapped at the baronet when he spoke to her. Sir
Griffin swore to himself that he wasn't going to be treated that way. He'd
have her, by George! There are men in whose love a good deal of hatred is
mixed--who love as the huntsman loves the fox, towards the killing of
which he intends to use all his energies and intellects. Mrs. Carbuncle,
who did not quite understand the sort of persistency by which a Sir
Griffin can be possessed, feared greatly that Lucinda was about to lose
her prize, and spoke out accordingly.

"Will you, then, just have the kindness to tell me what it is you propose
to yourself?" asked Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I don't propose anything."

"And where will you go when your money's done?"

"Just where I am going now," said Lucinda. By which it may be feared that
she indicated a place to which she should not on such an occasion have
made an allusion.

"You don't like anybody else?" suggested Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I don't like anybody or anything," said Lucinda.

"Yes, you do--you like horses to ride, and dresses to wear."

"No, I don't. I like hunting because, perhaps, some day I may break my
neck. It's no use your looking like that, Aunt Jane. I know what it all
means. If I could break my neck it would be the best thing for me."

"You'll break my heart, Lucinda."

"Mine's broken long ago."

"If you'll accept Sir Griffin, and just get a home round yourself, you'll
find that everything will be happy. It all comes from the dreadful
uncertainty. Do you think I have suffered nothing? Carbuncle is always
threatening that he'll go back to New York; and as for Lord George, he
treats me that way I'm sometimes afraid to show my face."

"Why should you care for Lord George?"

"It's all very well to say, why should I care for him. I don't care for
him, only one doesn't want to quarrel with one's friends. Carbuncle says
he owes him money."

"I don't believe it," said Lucinda.

"And he says Carbuncle owes him money."

"I do believe that," said Lucinda.

"Between it all, I don't know which way to be turning. And now, when
there's this great opening for you, you won't know your own mind."

"I know my mind well enough."

"I tell you you'll never have such another chance. Good looks isn't
everything. You've never a word to say to anybody; and when a man does
come near you, you're as savage and cross as a bear."

"Go on, Aunt Jane."

"What with your hatings and dislikings, one would suppose you didn't think
God Almighty made men at all."

"He made some of 'em very bad," said Lucinda. "As for some others, they're
only half made. What can Sir Griffin do, do you suppose?"

"He's a gentleman."

"Then if I were a man, I should wish not to be a gentleman; that's all.
I'd a deal sooner marry a man like that huntsman, who has something to do
and knows how to do it." Again she said, "Don't worry any more, Aunt Jane.
It doesn't do any good. It seems to me that to make myself Sir Griffin's
wife would be impossible; but I'm sure your talking won't do it." Then her
aunt left her, and, having met Lord George, at his bidding went and made
civil speeches to Lizzie Eustace.

That was on the Friday afternoon. On the Saturday afternoon Sir Griffin,
biding his time, found himself, in a ride with Lucinda, sufficiently far
from other horsemen for his purpose. He wasn't going to stand any more
nonsense. He was entitled to an answer, and he knew that he was entitled,
by his rank and position, to a favourable answer. Here was a girl who, as
far as he knew, was without a shilling, of whose birth and parentage
nobody knew anything, who had nothing but her beauty to recommend her--
nothing but that and a certain capacity for carrying herself in the world
as he thought ladies should carry themselves; and she was to give herself
airs with him, and expect him to propose to her half a dozen times! By
George! he had a very good mind to go away and let her find out her
mistake. And he would have done so--only that he was a man who always
liked to have all that he wanted. It was intolerable to him that anybody
should refuse him anything. "Miss Roanoke," he said; and then he paused.

"Sir Griffin," said Lucinda, bowing her head.

"Perhaps you will condescend to remember what I had the honour of saying
to you as we rode into Kilmarnock last Wednesday."

"I had just been dragged out of a river, Sir Griffin, and I don't think
any girl ought to be asked to remember what was said to her in that
condition."

"If I say it again now, will you remember?"

"I cannot promise, Sir Griffin."

"Will you give me an answer?"

"That must depend."

"Come, I will have an answer. When a man tells a lady that he admires her,
and asks her to be his wife, he has a right to an answer. Don't you think
that in such circumstances a man has a right to expect an answer?"

Lucinda hesitated for a moment, and he was beginning again to remonstrate
impatiently, when she altered her tone, and replied to him seriously: "In
such circumstances a gentleman has a right to expect an answer."

"Then give me one. I admire you above all the world, and I ask you to be
my wife. I'm quite in earnest."

"I know that you are in earnest, Sir Griffin. I would do neither you nor
myself the wrong of supposing that it could be otherwise."

"Very well then. Will you accept the offer that I make you?"

Again she paused. "You have a right to an answer, of course; but it may be
so difficult to give it. It seems to me that you have hardly realised how
serious a question it is."

"Haven't I though? By George, it is serious."

"Will it not be better for you to think it over again?"

He now hesitated for a moment. Perhaps it might be better. Should she take
him at his word there would be no going back from it. But Lord George knew
that he had proposed before. Lord George had learned this from Mrs.
Carbuncle, and had shown that he knew it. And then, too, he had made up
his mind about it. He wanted her, and he meant to have her. "It requires
no more thinking with me, Lucinda. I'm not a man who does things without
thinking; and when I have thought I don't want to think again. There's my
hand--will you have it?"

"I will," said Lucinda, putting her hand into his. He no sooner felt her
assurance than his mind misgave him that he had been precipitate, that he
had been rash, and that she had taken advantage of him. After all, how
many things are there in the world more precious than a handsome girl. And
she had never told him that she loved him.

"I suppose you love me?" he asked.

"H'sh; here they all are." The hand was withdrawn, but not before both
Mrs. Carbuncle and Lady Eustace had seen it.

Mrs. Carbuncle, in her great anxiety, bided her time, keeping close to her
niece. Perhaps she felt that if the two were engaged, it might be well to
keep the lovers separated for a while, lest they should quarrel before the
engagement should have been so confirmed by the authority of friends as to
be beyond the power of easy annihilation. Lucinda rode quite demurely with
the crowd. Sir Griffin remained near her, but without speaking. Lizzie
whispered to Lord George that there had been a proposal. Mrs. Carbuncle
sat in stately dignity on her horse, as though there was nothing which at
that moment especially engaged her attention. An hour almost had passed
before she was able to ask the important question, "Well--what have you
said to him?"

"Oh; just what you would have me."

"You have accepted him?"

"I suppose I was obliged. At any rate I did. You shall know one thing,
Aunt Jane, at any rate, and I hope it will make you comfortable. I hate a
good many people; but of all the people in the world I hate Sir Griffin
Tewett the worst."

"Nonsense, Lucinda."

"It shall be nonsense, if you please; but it's true. I shall have to lie
to him, but there shall be no lying to you, however much you may wish it.
I hate him!"

This was very grim, but Mrs Carbuncle quite understood that to persons
situated in great difficulty things might be grim. A certain amount of
grimness must be endured. And she knew, too, that Lucinda was not a girl
to be driven without showing something of an intractable spirit in
harness. Mrs. Carbuncle had undertaken the driving of Lucinda, and had
been not altogether unsuccessful. The thing so necessary to be done was
now effected. Her niece was engaged to a man with a title, to a man
reported to have a fortune, to a man of family, and a man of the world.
Now that the engagement was made, the girl could not go back from it, and
it was for Mrs. Carbuncle to see that neither should Sir Griffin go back.
Her first steps must be taken at once. The engagement should be made known
to all the party, and should be recognised by some word spoken between
herself and the lover. The word between herself and the lover must be the
first thing. She herself, personally, was not very fond of Sir Griffin;
but on such an occasion as this she could smile and endure the bear. Sir
Griffin was a bear--but so also was Lucinda. "The rabbits and hares All go
in pairs; And likewise the bears In couples agree." Mrs. Carbuncle
consoled herself with the song, and assured herself that it would all come
right. No doubt the she bears were not as civil to the he-bears as the
turtle doves are to each other. It was perhaps her misfortune that her
niece was not a turtle dove; but, such as she was, the best had been done
for her.

"Dear Sir Griffin," she said on the first available opportunity, not
caring much for the crowd, and almost desirous that her very words should
be overheard, "my darling girl has made me so happy by what she has told
me."

"She hasn't lost any time," said Sir Griffin.

"Of course she would lose no time. She is the same to me as a daughter. I
have no child of my own, and she is everything to me. May I tell you that
you are the luckiest man in Europe?"

"It isn't every girl that would suit me, Mrs. Carbuncle."

"I am sure of that. I have noticed how particular you are. I won't say a
word of Lucinda's beauty; men are better judges of that than women; but
for high chivalrous spirit, for true principle and nobility, and what I
call downright worth, I don't think you will easily find her superior. And
she is as true as steel."

"And about as hard, I was beginning to think."

"A girl like that, Sir Griffin, does not give herself away easily. You
will not like her the less for that now that you are the possessor. She is
very young, and has known my wish that she should not engage herself to
any one quite yet. But as it is, I cannot regret anything."

"I dare say not," said Sir Griffin.

That the man was a bear was a matter of course, and bears probably do not
themselves know how bearish they are. Sir Griffin, no doubt, was unaware
of the extent of his own rudeness. And his rudeness mattered but little to
Mrs. Carbuncle, so long as he acknowledged the engagement. She had not
expected a lover's raptures from the one more than from the other. And was
not there enough in the engagement to satisfy her? She allowed, therefore,
no cloud to cross her brow as she rode up alongside of Lord George. "Sir
Griffin has proposed, and she has accepted him," she said in a whisper.
She was not now desirous that any one should hear her but he to whom she
spoke.

"Of course she has," said Lord George.

"I don't know about that, George. Sometimes I thought she would, and
sometimes that she wouldn't. You have never understood Lucinda."

"I hope Griff will understand her, that's all. And now that the thing is
settled, you'll not trouble me about it any more. Their woes be on their
own head. If they come to blows Lucinda will thrash him, I don't doubt.
But while it's simply a matter of temper and words, she won't find Tewett
so easygoing as he looks."

"I believe they'll do very well together."

"Perhaps they will. There's no saying who may do well together. You and
Carbuncle get on _au marvel_. When is it to be?"

"Of course nothing is settled yet."

"Don't be too hard about settlements, or, maybe, he'll find a way of
wriggling out. When a girl without a shilling asks very much, the world
supports a man for breaking his engagement. Let her pretend to be
indifferent about it; that will be the way to keep him firm."

"What is his income, George?"

"I haven't an idea. There never was a closer man about money. I believe he
must have the bulk of the Tewett property some day. He can't spend above a
couple of thousand now."

"He's not in debt, is he?"

"He owes me a little money--twelve hundred or so--and I mean to have it. I
suppose he is in debt, but not much, I think. He makes stupid bets, and
the devil won't break him of it."

"Lucinda has two or three thousand pounds, you know."

"That's a flea-bite. Let her keep it. You're in for it now, and you'd
better say nothing about money. He has a decent solicitor, and let him
arrange about the settlements. And look here, Jane; get it done as soon as
you can."

"You'll help me?"

"If you don't bother me, I will."

On their way home Mrs. Carbuncle was able to tell Lady Eustace. "You know
what has occurred?"

"Oh, dear, yes," said Lizzie laughing.

"Has Lucinda told you?"

"Do you think I've got no eyes? Of course it was going to be. I knew that
from the very moment Sir Griffin reached Portray. I am so glad that
Portray has been useful."

"Oh, so useful, dear Lady Eustace! Not but what it must have come off
anywhere, for there never was a man so much in love as Sir Griffin. The
difficulty has been with Lucinda."

"She likes him, I suppose?"

"Oh, yes, of course," said Mrs. Carbuncle with energy.

"Not that girls ever really care about men now. They've got to be married,
and they make the best of it. She's very handsome, and I suppose he's
pretty well off."

"He will be very rich indeed. And they say he's such an excellent young
man when you know him."

"I dare say most young men are excellent when you come to know them. What
does Lord George say?"

"He's in raptures. He is very much attached to Lucinda, you know." And so
that affair was managed. They hadn't been home a quarter of an hour before
Frank Greystock was told. He asked Mrs. Carbuncle about the sport, and
then she whispered to him, "An engagement has been made."

"Sir Griffin?" suggested Frank. Mrs. Carbuncle smiled and nodded her head.
It was well that everybody should know it.




CHAPTER XLII

SUNDAY MORNING


"So, Miss, you've took him," said the joint Abigail of the Carbuncle
establishment that evening to the younger of her two mistresses. Mrs.
Carbuncle had resolved that the thing should be quite public.

"Just remember this," replied Lucinda, "I don't want to have a word said
to me on the subject."

"Only just to wish you joy, miss."

Lucinda turned round with a flash of anger at the girl. "I don't want your
wishing. That'll do. I can manage by myself. I won't have you come near me
if you can't hold your tongue when you're told."

"I can hold my tongue as well as anybody," said the Abigail with a toss of
her head.

This happened after the party had separated for the evening. At dinner Sir
Griffin had, of course, given Lucinda his arm; but so he had always done
since they had been at Portray. Lucinda hardly opened her mouth at table,
and had retreated to bed with a headache when the men, who on that day
lingered a few minutes after the ladies, went into the drawing-room. This
Sir Griffin felt to be almost an affront, as there was a certain process
of farewell for the night which he had anticipated. If she was going to
treat him like that, he would cut up rough, and she should know it.

"Well, Griff, so it's all settled," said Lord George in the smoking-room.
Frank Greystock was there, and Sir Griffin did not like it.

"What do you mean by settled? I don't know that anything is settled."

"I thought it was. Weren't you told so?" And Lord George turned to
Greystock.

"I thought I heard a hint," said Frank.

"I'm----if I ever knew such people in my life," said Sir Griffin. "They
don't seem to have an idea that a man's own affairs may be private."

"Such an affair as that never is private," said Lord George. "The women
take care of that. You don't suppose they're going to run down their game,
and let nobody know it."

"If they take me for game--"

"Of course you're game. Every man's game. Only some men are such bad game
that they ain't worth following. Take it easy, Griff; you're caught."

"No, I ain't."

"And enjoy the satisfaction of knowing that she's about the handsomest
girl out. As for me, I'd sooner have the widow. I beg your pardon, Mr.
Greystock." Frank merely bowed. "Simply, I mean, because she rides about
two stone lighter. It'll cost you something to mount Lady Tewett."

"I don't mean that she shall hunt," said Sir Griffin. It will be seen,
therefore, that the baronet made no real attempt to deny his engagement.

On the following day, which was Sunday, Sir Griffin, having ascertained
that Miss Roanoke did not intend to go to church, stayed at home also. Mr.
Emilius had been engaged to preach at the nearest Episcopal place of
worship, and the remainder of the party all went to hear him. Lizzie was
very particular about her Bible and Prayer-book, and Miss Macnulty wore a
brighter ribbon on her bonnet than she had ever been known to carry
before. Lucinda, when she had heard of the arrangement, had protested to
her aunt that she would not go down-stairs till they had all returned; but
Mrs. Carbuncle, fearing the anger of Sir Griffin, doubting whether in his
anger he might not escape them altogether, said a word or two which even
Lucinda found to be rational. "As you have accepted him, you shouldn't
avoid him, my dear. That is only making things worse for the future. And
then it's cowardly, is it not?" No word that could have been spoken was
more likely to be efficacious. At any rate, she would not be cowardly.

As soon then as the wheels of the carriage were no longer heard grating
upon the road, Lucinda, who had been very careful in her dress, so careful
as to avoid all appearance of care, with slow majestic step descended to a
drawing-room which they were accustomed to use on mornings. It was
probable that Sir Griffin was smoking somewhere about the grounds, but it
could not be her duty to go after him out of doors. She would remain
there, and, if he chose, he might come to her. There could be no ground of
complaint on his side if she allowed herself to be found in one of the
ordinary sitting-rooms of the house. In about half an hour he sauntered
upon the terrace, and flattened his nose against the window. She bowed and
smiled to him, hating herself for smiling. It was perhaps the first time
that she had endeavoured to put on a pleasant face wherewithal to greet
him. He said nothing then, but passed round the house, threw away the end
of his cigar, and entered the room. Whatever happened, she would not be a
coward. The thing had to be done. Seeing that she had accepted him on the
previous day, had not run away in the night or taken poison, and had come
down to undergo the interview, she would undergo it at least with courage.
What did it matter, even though he should embrace her? It was her lot to
undergo misery, and as she had not chosen to take poison, the misery must
be endured. She rose as he entered and gave him her hand. She had thought
what she would do, and was collected and dignified. He had not, and was
very awkward.

"So you haven't gone to church, Sir Griffin, as you ought," she said, with
another smile.

"Come, I've gone as much as you."

"But I had a headache. You stayed away to smoke cigars."

"I stayed to see you, my girl." A lover may call his ladylove his girl,
and do so very prettily. He may so use the word that she will like it, and
be grateful in her heart for the sweetness of the sound. But Sir Griffin
did not do it nicely. "I've got ever so much to say to you."

"I won't flatter you by saying that I stayed to hear it."

"But you did; didn't you now?" She shook her head; but there was something
almost of playfulness in her manner of doing it. "Ah, but I know you did.
And why shouldn't you speak out, now that we are to be man and wife? I
like a girl to speak out. I suppose if I want to be with you, you want as
much to be with me; eh?"

"I don't see that that follows."

"By ----, if it doesn't I'll be off."

"You must please yourself about that, Sir Griffin."

"Come; do you love me? You have never said you loved me." Luckily perhaps
for her, he thought that the best assurance of love was a kiss. She did
not revolt, or attempt to struggle with him; but the hot blood flew over
her entire face, and her lips were very cold to his, and she almost
trembled in his grasp. Sir Griffin was not a man who could ever have been
the adored of many women, but the instincts of his kind were strong enough
within him to make him feel that she did not return his embrace with
passion. He had found her to be very beautiful; but it seemed to him that
she had never been so little beautiful as when thus pressed close to his
bosom. "Come," he said, still holding her, "you'll give me a kiss?"

"I did do it," she said.

"No; nothing like it. Oh, if you won't, you know----."

On a sudden she made up her mind, and absolutely did kiss him. She would
sooner have leaped at the blackest, darkest, dirtiest river in the county.
"There," she said, "that will do," gently extricating herself from his
arms. "Some girls are different, I know; but you must take me as I am, Sir
Griffin; that is, if you do take me."

"Why can't you drop the Sir?"

"Oh yes; I can do that."

"And you do love me?" There was a pause, while she tried to swallow the
lie. "Come; I'm not going to marry any girl who is ashamed to say that she
loves me. I like a little flesh and blood. You do love me?"

"Yes," she said. The lie was told; and for the moment he had to be
satisfied. But in his heart he didn't believe her. It was all very well
for her to say that she wasn't like other girls. Why shouldn't she be like
other girls? It might, no doubt, suit her to be made Lady Tewett; but he
wouldn't make her Lady Tewett if she gave herself airs with him. She
should lie on his breast and swear that she loved him beyond all the
world, or else she should never be Lady Tewett. Different from other girls
indeed! She should know that he was different from other men. Then he
asked her to come and take a walk about the grounds. To that she made no
objection. She would get her hat and be with him in a minute.

But she was absent more than ten minutes. When she was alone she stood
before her glass looking at herself, and then she burst into tears. Never
before had she been thus polluted. The embrace had disgusted her. It made
her odious to herself. And if this, the beginning of it, was so bad, how
was she to drink the cup to the bitter dregs? Other girls, she knew, were
fond of their lovers--some so fond of them that all moments of absence
were moments, if not of pain, at any rate of regret. To her, as she stood
there ready to tear herself because of the vileness of her own condition,
it now seemed as though no such love as that were possible to her. For the
sake of this man who was to be her husband, she hated all men. Was not
everything around her base, and mean, and sordid? She had understood
thoroughly the quick divulgings of Mrs. Carbuncle's tidings, the working
of her aunt's anxious mind. The man, now that he had been caught, was not
to be allowed to escape. But how great would be the boon if he would
escape. How should she escape? And yet she knew that she meant to go on
and bear it all. Perhaps by study and due practice she might become--as
were some others--a beast of prey and nothing more. The feeling that had
made these few minutes so inexpressibly loathsome to her might, perhaps,
be driven from her heart. She washed the tears from her eyes with savage
energy, and descended to her lover with a veil fastened closely under her
hat. "I hope I haven't kept you waiting," she said.

"Women always do," he replied laughing. "It gives them importance."

"It is not so with me, I can assure you. I will tell you the truth. I was
agitated, and I cried."

"Oh, ay; I dare say." He rather liked the idea of having reduced the
haughty Lucinda to tears. "But you needn't have been ashamed of my seeing
it. As it is, I can see nothing. You must take that off presently."

"Not now, Griffin." Oh, what a name it was! It seemed to blister her
tongue as she used it without the usual prefix.

"I never saw you tied up in that way before. You don't do it out hunting.
I've seen you when the snow has been driving in your face, and you didn't
mind it--not so much as I did."

"You can't be surprised that I should be agitated now."

"But you're happy, ain't you?"

"Yes," she said. The lie once told must of course be continued.

 "Upon my word, I don't quite understand you," said Sir Griffin. "Look
here, Lucinda; if you want to back out of it you can, you know."

"If you ask me again, I will." This was said with the old savage voice,
and it at once reduced Sir Griffin to thraldom. To be rejected now would
be the death of him. And should there come a quarrel, he was sure that it
would seem to be that he had been rejected.

"I suppose it's all right," he said; "only when a man is only thinking how
he can make you happy, he doesn't like to find nothing but crying." After
this there was but little more said between them before they returned to
the castle.




CHAPTER XLIII

LIFE AT PORTRAY


On the Monday Frank took his departure. Everybody at the castle had liked
him except Sir Griffin, who, when he had gone, remarked to Lucinda that he
was an insufferable legal prig, and one of those chaps who think
themselves somebody because they are in Parliament. Lucinda had liked
Frank, and said so very boldly. "I see what it is," replied Sir Griffin;
"you always like the people I don't."

When he was going, Lizzie left her hand in his for a moment, and gave one
look up into his eyes. "When is Lucy to be made blessed?" she asked.

"I don't know that Lucy will ever be made blessed," he replied, "but I am
sure I hope she will." Not a word more was said, and he returned to
London.

After that Mrs. Carbuncle and Lucinda remained at Portray Castle till
after Christmas, greatly overstaying the original time fixed for their
visit. Lord George and Sir Griffin went and returned, and went again and
returned again. There was much hunting and a great many love passages,
which need not be recorded here. More than once during these six or seven
weeks there arose a quarrel, bitter, loud, and pronounced, between Sir
Griffin and Lucinda; but Lord George and Mrs. Carbuncle between them
managed to throw oil upon the waters, and when Christmas came the
engagement was still an engagement. The absolute suggestion that it should
be broken, and abandoned, and thrown to the winds, always came from
Lucinda; and Sir Griffin, when he found that Lucinda was in earnest, would
again be moved by his old desires, and would determine that he would have
the thing he wanted. Once he behaved with such coarse brutality that
nothing but an abject apology would serve the turn. He made the abject
apology, and after that became conscious that his wings were clipped, and
that he must do as he was bidden. Lord George took him away, and brought
him back again, and blew him up; and at last, under pressure from Mrs.
Carbuncle, made him consent to the fixing of a day. The marriage was to
take place during the first week in April. When the party moved from
Portray he was to go up to London and see his lawyer. Settlements were to
be arranged, and something was to be fixed as to future residence.

In the midst of all this Lucinda was passive as regarded the making of the
arrangements, but very troublesome to those around her as to her immediate
mode of life. Even to Lady Eustace she was curt and uncivil. To her aunt
she was at times ferocious. She told Lord George more than once to his
face that he was hurrying her to perdition.

"What the d---- is it you want?" Lord George said to her.

"Not to be married to this man."

"But you have accepted him. I didn't ask you to take him. You don't want
to go into a workhouse, I suppose?"

Then she rode so hard that all the Ayrshire lairds were startled out of
their propriety, and there was a general fear that she would meet some
terrible accident. And Lizzie, instigated by jealousy, learned to ride as
hard, and as they rode against each other every day, there was a turmoil
in the hunt. Morgan, scratching his head, declared that he had known
"drunken rampaging men," but had never seen ladies so wicked. Lizzie did
come down rather badly at one wall, and Lucinda got herself jammed against
a gate-post. But when Christmas was come and gone, and Portray Castle had
been left empty, no very bad accident had occurred.

A great friendship had sprung up between Mrs. Carbuncle and Lizzie, so
that both had become very communicative. Whether both or either had been
candid may, perhaps, be doubted. Mrs. Carbuncle had been quite
confidential in discussing with her friend the dangerous varieties of
Lucinda's humours, and the dreadful aversion which she still seemed to
entertain for Sir Griffin. But then these humours and this aversion were
so visible, that they could not well be concealed; and what can be the use
of confidential communications if things are kept back which the
confidante would see even if they were not told?

"She would be just like that, whoever the man was," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I suppose so," said Lizzie, wondering at such a phenomenon in female
nature. But with this fact, understood between them to be a fact--namely,
that Lucinda would be sure to hate any man whom she might accept--they
both agreed that the marriage had better go on.

"She must take a husband some day, you know," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Of course," said Lizzie.

"With her good looks, it would be out of the question that she shouldn't
be married."

"Quite out of the question," repeated Lizzie.

"And I really don't see how she's to do better. It's her nature, you know.
I have had enough of it, I can tell you. And at the pension, near Paris,
they couldn't break her in at all. Nobody could ever break her in. You see
it in the way she rides."

"I suppose Sir Griffin must do it," said Lizzie, laughing.

"Well--that, or the other thing, you know." But there was no doubt about
this--whoever might break or be broken, the marriage must go on. "If you
don't persevere with one like her, Lady Eustace, nothing can be done."
Lizzie quite concurred. What did it matter to her who should break, or who
be broken, if she could only sail her own little bark without dashing it
on the rocks? Rocks there were. She didn't quite know what to make of Lord
George, who certainly was a Corsair--who had said some very pretty things
to her, quite à la Corsair. But in the mean time, from certain rumours
that she heard, she believed that Frank had given up, or at least was
intending to give up, the little chit who was living with Lady Linlithgow.
There had been something of a quarrel--so, at least, she had heard through
Miss Macnulty, with whom Lady Linlithgow still occasionally corresponded
in spite of their former breaches. From Frank, Lizzie heard repeatedly but
Frank in his letters never mentioned the name of Lucy Morris. Now, if
there should be a division between Frank and Lucy, then, she thought,
Frank would return to her. And if so, for a permanent holding rock of
protection in the world, her cousin Frank would be at any rate safer than
the Corsair.

Lizzie and Mrs. Carbuncle had quite come to understand each other
comfortably about money. It suited Mrs. Carbuncle very well to remain at
Portray. It was no longer necessary that she should carry Lucinda about in
search of game to be run down. The one head of game needed had been run
down, such as it was--not, indeed, a very noble stag; but the stag had
been accepted; and a home for herself and her niece, which should have
about it a sufficient air of fashion to satisfy public opinion--out of
London--better still, in Scotland, belonging to a person with a title,
enjoying the appurtenances of wealth, and one to which Lord George and Sir
Griffin could have access--was very desirable. But it was out of the
question that Lady Eustace should bear all the expense. Mrs. Carbuncle
undertook to find the stables, and did pay for that rick of hay and for
the cartload of forage which had made Lizzie's heart quake as she saw it
dragged up the hill towards her own granaries. It is very comfortable when
all these things are clearly understood. Early in January they were all to
go back to London. Then for a while--up to the period of Lucinda's
marriage--Lizzie was to be Mrs. Carbuncle's guest at the small house in
May Fair, but Lizzie was to keep the carriage. There came at last to be
some little attempt, perhaps, at a hard bargain at the hand of each lady,
in which Mrs. Carbuncle, as the elder, probably got the advantage. There
was a question about the liveries in London. The footman there must
appertain to Mrs. Carbuncle, whereas the coachman would as necessarily be
one of Lizzie's retainers. Mrs. Carbuncle assented at last to finding the
double livery--but, like a prudent woman, arranged to get her quid pro
quo. "You can add something, you know, to the present you'll have to give
Lucinda. Lucinda shall choose something up to forty pounds."

"We'll say thirty," said Lizzie, who was beginning to know the value of
money.

"Split the difference," said Mrs. Carbuncle, with a pleasant little burst
of laughter--and the difference was split. That the very neat and even
dandified appearance of the groom who rode out hunting with them should be
provided at the expense of Mrs. Carbuncle was quite understood; but it was
equally well understood that Lizzie was to provide the horse on which he
rode, on every third day. It adds greatly to the comfort of friends living
together when these things are accurately settled.

Mr. Emilius remained longer than had been anticipated, and did not go till
Lord George and Sir Griffin took their departure. It was observed that he
never spoke of his wife; and yet Mrs. Carbuncle was almost sure that she
had heard of such a lady. He had made himself very agreeable, and was,
either by art or nature, a courteous man, one who paid compliments to
ladies. It was true, however, that he sometimes startled his hearers, by
things which might have been considered to border on coarseness if they
had not been said by a clergyman. Lizzie had an idea that he intended to
marry Miss Macnulty. And Miss Macnulty certainly received his attentions
with pleasure. In these circumstances his prolonged stay at the castle was
not questioned; but when towards the end of November Lord George and Sir
Griffin took their departure, he was obliged to return to his flock.

On the great subject of the diamonds Lizzie had spoken her mind freely to
Mrs. Carbuncle early in the days of their friendship--immediately, that
is, after the bargaining had been completed. "Ten thousand pounds!"
ejaculated Mrs. Carbuncle, opening wide her eyes. Lizzie nodded her head
thrice, in token of reiterated assurance. "Do you mean that you really
know their value?" The ladies at this time were closeted together, and
were discussing many things in the closest confidence.

"They were valued for me by jewellers."

"Ten thousand pounds! And Sir Florian gave them to you?"

"Put them round my neck, and told me they were to be mine, always."

"Generous man!"

"Ah, if you had but known him!" said Lizzie, just touching her eye with
her handkerchief.

"I dare say. And now the people claim them. I'm not a bit surprised at
that, my dear. I should have thought a man couldn't give away so much as
that, not just as one makes a present that costs forty or fifty pounds."
Mrs. Carbuncle could not resist the opportunity of showing that she did
not think so very much of that coming thirty-five-pound "gift" for which
the bargain had been made.

"That's what they say. And they say ever so many other things besides.
They mean to prove that it's an--heirloom."

"Perhaps it is."

"But it isn't. My cousin Frank, who knows more about law than any other
man in London, says that they can't make a necklace an heirloom. If it was
a brooch or a ring, it would be different. I don't quite understand it,
but it is so."

"It's a pity Sir Florian didn't say something about it in his will,"
suggested Mrs. Carbuncle.

"But he did; at least, not just about the necklace." Then Lady Eustace
explained the nature of her late husband's will, as far as it regarded
chattels to be found in the castle of Portray at the time of his death;
and added the fiction, which had now become common to her, as to the
necklace having been given to her in Scotland.

"I shouldn't let them have it," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I don't mean," said Lizzie.

"I should sell them," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"But why?"

"Because there are so many accidents. A woman should be very rich indeed
before she allows herself to walk about with ten thousand pounds upon her
shoulders. Suppose somebody broke into the house and stole them. And if
they were sold, my dear, so that some got to Paris, and others to St.
Petersburg, and others to New York, they'd have to give it up then."
Before the discussion was over Lizzie tripped upstairs and brought the
necklace down and put it on Mrs. Carbuncle's neck. "I shouldn't like to
have such property in my house, my dear," continued Mrs. Carbuncle. "Of
course diamonds are very nice. Nothing is so nice. And if a person had a
proper place to keep them, and all that----"

"I've a very strong iron case," said Lizzie.

"But they should be at the bank, or at the jeweller's, or somewhere quite
--quite safe. People might steal the case and all. If I were you I should
sell them." It was explained to Mrs. Carbuncle on that occasion that
Lizzie had brought them down with her in the train from London, and that
she intended to take them back in the same way. "There's nothing the
thieves would find easier than to steal them on the way," said Mrs.
Carbuncle.

It was some days after this that there came down to her by post some
terribly frightful documents, which were the first results, as far as she
was concerned, of the filing of a bill in Chancery; which hostile
proceeding was, in truth, effected by the unaided energy of Mr.
Camperdown, although Mr. Camperdown put himself forward simply as an
instrument used by the trustees of the Eustace property. Within eight days
she was to enter an appearance, or go through some preliminary ceremony
toward showing why she should not surrender her diamonds to the Lord
Chancellor, or to one of those satraps of his, the Vice-Chancellors, or to
some other terrible myrmidon. Mr. Camperdown in his letter explained that
the service of this document upon her in Scotland would amount to nothing,
even were he to send it down by a messenger; but that no doubt she would
send it to her attorney, who would see the expediency of avoiding exposure
by accepting the service. Of all which explanation Lizzie did not
understand one word. Messrs. Camperdown's letter and the document which it
contained did frighten her considerably, although the matter had been
discussed so often that she had accustomed herself to declare that no such
bugbear as that should have any influence on her. She had asked Frank
whether, in the event of such missiles reaching her, she might send them
to him. He had told her that they should be at once placed in the hands of
her attorney; and consequently she now sent them to Messrs. Mowbray &
Mopus, with a very short note from herself. "Lady Eustace presents her
compliments to Messrs. Mowbray & Mopus, and encloses some papers she has
received about her diamonds. They are her own diamonds, given to her by
her late husband. Please do what is proper, but Mr. Camperdown ought to be
made to pay all the expenses."

She had, no doubt, allowed herself to hope that no further steps would be
taken in the matter; and the very name of the Vice-Chancellor did for a
few hours chill the blood at her heart. In those few hours she almost
longed to throw the necklace into the sea, feeling sure that, if the
diamonds were absolutely lost, there must be altogether an end of the
matter, But, by degrees, her courage returned to her, as she remembered
that her cousin had told her that, as far as he could see, the necklace
was legally her own. Her cousin had, of course, been deceived by the lies
which she had repeated to him; but lies which had been efficacious with
him might be efficacious with others. Who could prove that Sir Florian had
not taken the diamonds to Scotland, and given them to her there, in that
very house which was now her own?

She told Mrs. Carbuncle of the missiles which had been hurled at her from
the London courts of law, and Mrs. Carbuncle evidently thought that the
diamonds were as good as gone. "Then I suppose you can't sell them," said
she.

"Yes, I could; I could sell them to-morrow. What is to hinder me? Suppose
I took them to jewellers in Paris?"

"The jewellers would think you had stolen them."

"I didn't steal them," said Lizzie. "They're my very own. Frank says that
nobody can take them away from me. Why shouldn't a man give his wife a
diamond necklace as well as a diamond ring? That's what I can't
understand. What may he give her so that men sha'n't come and worry her
life out of her in this way? As for an heirloom, anybody who knows
anything, knows it can't be an heirloom. A pot or a pan may be an
heirloom; but a diamond necklace cannot be an heirloom. Everybody knows
that, that knows anything."

"I dare say it will all come right," said Mrs. Carbuncle, who did not in
the least believe Lizzie's law about the pot and pan.

In the first week in January Lord George and Sir Griffin returned to the
castle with the view of travelling up to London with the three ladies.
This arrangement was partly thrown over by circumstances, as Sir Griffin
was pleased to leave Portray two days before the others and to travel by
himself. There was a bitter quarrel between Lucinda and her lover, and it
was understood afterwards by Lady Eustace that Sir Griffin had had a few
words with Lord George; but what those few words were, she never quite
knew. There was no open rupture between the two gentlemen, but Sir Griffin
showed his displeasure to the ladies, who were more likely to bear
patiently his ill-humour in the present circumstances than was Lord
George. When a man has shown himself to be so far amenable to feminine
authority as to have put himself in the way of matrimony, ladies will bear
a great deal from him. There was nothing which Mrs. Carbuncle would not
endure from Sir Griffin, just at present; and, on behalf of Mrs.
Carbuncle, even Lizzie was long-suffering. It cannot, however, be said
that this Petruchio had as yet tamed his own peculiar shrew. Lucinda was
as savage as ever, and would snap and snarl, and almost bite. Sir Griffin
would snarl too, and say very bearish things. But when it came to the
point of actual quarrelling, he would become sullen, and in his sullenness
would yield.

"I don't see why Carruthers should have it all his own way," he said, one
hunting morning, to Lucinda.

"I don't care twopence who have their way," said Lucinda, "I mean to have
mine; that's all."

"I'm not speaking about you. I call it downright interference on his part.
And I do think you give way to him. You never do anything that I suggest."

"You never suggest anything that I like to do," said Lucinda.

"That's a pity," said Sir Griffin, "considering that I shall have to
suggest so many things that you will have to do."

"I don't know that at all," said Lucinda.

Mrs. Carbuncle came up during the quarrel, meaning to throw oil upon the
waters. "What children you are!" she said laughing. "As if each of you
won't have to do what the other suggests."

"Mrs. Carbuncle," began Sir Griffin, "if you will have the great kindness
not to endeavour to teach me what my conduct should be now or at any
future time, I shall take it as a kindness."

"Sir Griffin, pray don't quarrel with Mrs. Carbuncle," said Lizzie.

"Lady Eustace, if Mrs. Carbuncle interferes with me, I shall quarrel with
her. I have borne a great deal more of this kind of thing than I like. I'm
not going to be told this and told that because Mrs. Carbuncle happens to
be the aunt of the future Lady Tewett--if it should come to that. I'm not
going to marry a whole family; and the less I have of this kind of thing
the more likely it is that I shall come up to scratch when the time is
up."

Then Lucinda rose and spoke. "Sir Griffin Tewett," she said, "there is not
the slightest necessity that you should 'come up to scratch.' I wonder
that I have not as yet been able to make you understand that if it will
suit your convenience to break off our match, it will not in the least
interfere with mine. And let me tell you this, Sir Griffin, that any
repetition of your unkindness to my aunt will make me utterly refuse to
see you again."

"Of course you like her better than you do me."

"A great deal better," said Lucinda.

"If I stand that I'll be ----," said Sir Griffin, leaving the room. And he
left the castle, sleeping that night in the inn at Kilmarnock. The day,
however, was passed in hunting; and though he said nothing to either of
the three ladies, it was understood by them as they returned to Portray
that there was to be no quarrel. Lord George and Sir Griffin had discussed
the matter, and Lord George took upon himself to say that there was no
quarrel. On the morning but one following, there came a note from Sir
Griffin to Lucinda just as they were leaving home for their journey up to
London, in which Sir Griffin expressed his regret if he had said anything
displeasing to Mrs. Carbuncle.




CHAPTER XLIV

A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE


Something as to the jewels had been told to Lord George; and this was
quite necessary, as Lord George intended to travel with the ladies from
Portray to London. Of course he had heard of the diamonds, as who had not?
He had heard too of Lord Fawn, and knew why it was that Lord Fawn had
peremptorily refused to carry out his engagement. But, till he was told by
Mrs. Carbuncle, he did not know that the diamonds were then kept within
the castle, nor did he understand that it would be part of his duty to
guard them on their way back to London.

"They are worth ever so much, ain't they?" he said to Mrs. Carbuncle, when
she first gave him the information.

"Ten thousand pounds," said Mrs. Carbuncle, almost with awe.

"I don't believe a word of it," said Lord George.

"She says that they've been valued at that, since she's had them."

Lord George owned to himself that such a necklace was worth having, as
also, no doubt, were Portray Castle and the income arising from the
estate, even though they could be held in possession only for a single
life. Hitherto in his very checkered career he had escaped the trammels of
matrimony, and among his many modes of life had hardly even suggested to
himself the expediency of taking a wife with a fortune, and then settling
down for the future, if submissively, still comfortably. To say that he
had never looked forward to such a marriage as a possible future
arrangement would probably be incorrect. To men such as Lord George it is
too easy a result of a career to be altogether banished from the mind. But
no attempt had ever yet been made, nor had any special lady ever been so
far honoured in his thoughts as to be connected in them with any vague
ideas which he might have formed on the subject. But now it did occur to
him that Portray Castle was a place in which he could pass two or three
months annually without ennui; and that if he were to marry, little Lizzie
Eustace would do as well as any other woman with money whom he might
chance to meet. He did not say all this to any body, and therefore cannot
be accused of vanity. He was the last man in the world to speak on such a
subject to any one. And as even Lizzie certainly bestowed upon him many of
her smiles, much of her poetry, and some of her confidence, it cannot be
said that he was not justified in his views. But then she was such an--
"infernal little liar." Lord George was quite able to discover so much of
her.

"She does lie, certainly," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "but then who doesn't?"

On the morning of their departure the box with the diamonds was brought
down into the hall just as they were about to depart. The tall London
footman again brought it down, and deposited it on one of the oak hall-
chairs, as though it were a thing so heavy that he could hardly stagger
along with it. How Lizzie did hate the man as she watched him, and regret
that she had not attempted to carry it down herself. She had been with her
diamonds that morning, and had had them out of the box and into it. Few
days passed on which she did not handle them and gaze at them. Mrs.
Carbuncle had suggested that the box, with all her diamonds in it, might
be stolen from her, and as she thought of this her heart almost sank
within her. When she had them once again in London she would take some
steps to relieve herself from this embarrassment of carrying about with
her so great a burden of care. The man, with a vehement show of exertion,
deposited the box on a chair, and then groaned aloud. Lizzie knew very
well that she could lift the box by her own unaided exertions, and the
groan was at any rate unnecessary.

"Supposing somebody were to steal that on the way," said Lord George to
her, not in his pleasantest tone.

"Do not suggest anything so horrible," said Lizzie, trying to laugh.

"I shouldn't like it at all," said Lord George.

"I don't think it would make me a bit unhappy. You've heard about it all.
There never was such a persecution. I often say that I should be well
pleased to take the bauble and fling it into the ocean waves."

"I should like to be a mermaid and catch it," said Lord George.

"And what better would you be? Such things are all vanity and vexation of
spirit. I hate the shining thing." And she hit the box with the whip she
held in her hand.

It had been arranged that the party should sleep at Carlisle. It consisted
of Lord George, the three ladies, the tall man servant, Lord George's own
man, and the two maids. Miss Macnulty, with the heir and the nurses, were
to remain at Portray for yet a while longer. The iron box was again put
into the carriage, and was used by Lizzie as a footstool. This might have
been very well, had there been no necessity for changing their train. At
Troon the porter behaved well, and did not struggle much as he carried it
from the carriage on to the platform. But at Kilmarnock, where they met
the train from Glasgow, the big footman interfered again, and the scene
was performed under the eyes of a crowd of people. It seemed to Lizzie
that Lord George almost encouraged the struggling, as though he were in
league with the footman to annoy her. But there was no further change
between Kilmarnock and Carlisle, and they managed to make themselves very
comfortable. Lunch had been provided; for Mrs. Carbuncle was a woman who
cared for such things, and Lord George also liked a glass of champagne in
the middle of the day. Lizzie professed to be perfectly indifferent on
such matters; but nevertheless she enjoyed her lunch, and allowed Lord
George to press upon her a second, and perhaps a portion of a third glass
of wine. Even Lucinda was roused up from her general state of apathy, and
permitted herself to forget Sir Griffin for a while.

During this journey to Carlisle Lizzie Eustace almost made up her mind
that Lord George was the very Corsair she had been expecting ever since
she had mastered Lord Byron's great poem. He had a way of doing things and
of saying things, of proclaiming himself to be master, and at the same
time of making himself thoroughly agreeable to his dependents, and
especially to the one dependent whom he most honoured at the time, which
exactly suited Lizzie's ideas of what a man should be. And then he
possessed that utter indifference to all conventions and laws which is the
great prerogative of Corsairs. He had no reverence for aught divine or
human, which is a great thing. The Queen and Parliament, the bench of
bishops, and even the police, were to him just so many fungi and
parasites, and noxious vapours, and false hypocrites. Such were the names
by which he ventured to call these bugbears of the world. It was so
delightful to live with a man who himself had a title of his own, but who
could speak of dukes and marquises as being quite despicable by reason of
their absurd position. And as they became gay and free after their
luncheon he expressed almost as much contempt for honesty as for dukes,
and showed clearly that he regarded matrimony and marquises to be equally
vain and useless. "How dare you say such things in our hearing?" exclaimed
Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I assert that if men and women were really true, no vows would be needed;
and if no vows, then no marriage vows. Do you believe such vows are kept?"

"Yes," said Mrs. Carbuncle enthusiastically.

"I don't," said Lucinda.

"Nor I," said the Corsair. "Who can believe that a woman will always love
her husband because she swears she will? The oath is false on the face of
it."

"But women must marry," said Lizzie. The Corsair declared freely that he
did not see any such necessity.

And then, though it could hardly be said that this Corsair was a handsome
man, still he had fine Corsair eyes, full of expression and determination,
eyes that could look love and bloodshed almost at the same time; and then
he had those manly properties--power, bigness, and apparent boldness--
which belong to a Corsair. To be hurried about the world by such a man,
treated sometimes with crushing severity, and at others with the tenderest
love, not to be spoken to for one fortnight, and then to be embraced
perpetually for another, to be cast every now and then into some abyss of
despair by his rashness, and then raised to a pinnacle of human joy by his
courage--that, thought Lizzie, would be the kind of life which would suit
her poetical temperament. But then, how would it be with her if the
Corsair were to take to hurrying about the world without carrying her with
him, and were to do so always at her expense? Perhaps he might hurry about
the world and take somebody else with him. Medora, if Lizzie remembered
rightly, had had no jointure or private fortune. But yet a woman must risk
something if the spirit of poetry is to be allowed any play at all! "And
now these weary diamonds again," said Lord George, as the carriage was
stopped against the Carlisle platform. "I suppose they must go into your
bedroom, Lady Eustace?"

"I wish you'd let the man put the box in yours, just for this night," said
Lizzie.

"No, not if I know it," said Lord George. And then he explained. Such
property would be quite as liable to be stolen when in his custody as it
would in hers; but if stolen while in his would entail upon him a grievous
vexation which would by no means lessen the effect of her loss. She did
not understand him, but finding that he was quite in earnest she directed
that the box should be again taken to her own chamber. Lord George
suggested that it should be intrusted to the landlord; and for a moment or
two Lizzie submitted to the idea. But she stood for that moment thinking
of it, and then decided that the box should go to her own room.

"There's no knowing what that Mr. Camperdown mightn't do," she whispered
to Lord George. The porter and the tall footman, between them, staggered
along under their load, and the iron box was again deposited in the
bedroom of the Carlisle inn.

The evening at Carlisle was spent very pleasantly. The ladies agreed that
they would not dress--but of course they did so with more or less of care.
Lizzie made herself to look very pretty, though the skirt of the gown in
which she came down was that which she had worn during the journey.
Pointing this out with much triumph, she accused Mrs. Carbuncle and
Lucinda of great treachery, in that they had not adhered to any vestige of
their travelling raiment. But the rancour was not vehement, and the
evening was passed pleasantly. Lord George was infinitely petted by the
three Houris around him, and Lizzie called him a Corsair to his face.

"And you are the Medora," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Oh no. That is your place, certainly," said Lizzie.

"What a pity Sir Griffin isn't here," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "that we might
call him the Giaour." Lucinda shuddered, without any attempt at concealing
her shudder. "That's all very well, Lucinda, but I think Sir Griffin would
make a very good Giaour."

"Pray don't, aunt. Let one forget it all just for a moment."

"I wonder what Sir Griffin would say if he was to hear this," said Lord
George.

Late in the evening Lord George strolled out, and of course all the ladies
discussed his character in his absence. Mrs. Carbuncle declared that he
was the soul of honour. In regard to her own feeling for him, she averred
that no woman had ever had a truer friend. Any other sentiment was of
course out of the question, for was she not a married woman? Had it not
been for that accident Mrs. Carbuncle really thought that she could have
given her heart to Lord George. Lucinda declared that she always regarded
him as a kind of supplementary father.

"I suppose he is a year or two older than Sir Griffin," said Lizzie.

"Lady Eustace, why should you make me unhappy?" said Lucinda.

Then Mrs. Carbuncle explained that whereas Sir Griffin was not yet thirty,
Lord George was over forty.

"All I can say is, he doesn't look it," urged Lady Eustace
enthusiastically.

"Those sort of men never do," said Mrs. Carbuncle. Lord George, when he
returned, was greeted with an allusion to angels' wings, and would have
been a good deal spoiled among them were it in the nature of such an
article to receive injury. As soon as the clock had struck ten the ladies
all went away to their beds.

Lizzie, when she was in her own room, of course found her maid waiting for
her. It was necessarily part of the religion of such a woman as Lizzie
Eustace that she could not go to bed, or change her clothes, or get up in
the morning, without the assistance of her own young woman. She would not
like to have it thought that she could stick a pin into her own belongings
without such assistance. Nevertheless it was often the case with her that
she was anxious to get rid of her girl's attendance. It had been so on
this morning and before dinner, and was so now again. She was secret in
her movements, and always had some recess in her boxes and bags and
dressing apparatuses to which she did not choose that Miss Patience
Crabstick should have access. She was careful about her letters, and very
careful about her money. And then as to that iron box in which the
diamonds were kept! Patience Crabstick had never yet seen the inside of
it. Moreover it may be said, either on Lizzie's behalf or to her
discredit, as the reader may be pleased to take it, that she was quite
able to dress herself, to brush her own hair, to take off her own clothes;
and that she was not, either by nature or education, an incapable young
woman. But that honour and glory demanded it, she would almost as lief
have had no Patience Crabstick to pry into her most private matters. All
which Crabstick knew, and would often declare her missus to be "of all
missuses the most slyest and least come-at-able." On this present night
she was very soon despatched to her own chamber. Lizzie, however, took one
careful look at the iron box before the girl was sent away.

Crabstick, on this occasion, had not far to go to seek her own couch.
Alongside of Lizzie's larger chamber there was a small room, a dressing-
room with a bed in it, which, for this night, was devoted to Crabstick's
accommodation. Of course she departed from attendance on her mistress by
the door which opened from the one room to the other; but this had no
sooner been closed than Crabstick descended to complete the amusements of
the evening. Lizzie, when she was alone, bolted both the doors on the
inside, and then quickly retired to rest. Some short prayer she said, with
her knees close to the iron box. Then she put certain articles of property
under her pillow, her watch and chain, and the rings from her fingers, and
a packet which she had drawn from her travelling-desk, and was soon in
bed, thinking that, as she fell away to sleep, she would revolve in her
mind that question of the Corsair: would it be good to trust herself and
all her belongings to one who might perhaps take her belongings away, but
leave herself behind? The subject was not unpleasant, and while she was
considering it she fell asleep.

It was, perhaps, about two in the morning when a man, very efficient at
the trade which he was then following, knelt outside Lady Eustace's door,
and, with a delicately-made saw, aided probably by some other equally
well-finished tools, absolutely cut out that portion of the bedroom door
on which the bolt was fastened. He must have known the spot exactly, for
he did not doubt a moment as he commenced his work; and yet there was
nothing on the exterior of the door to show where the bolt was placed. The
bit was cut out without the slightest noise, and then, when the door was
opened, was placed just inside upon the floor. The man then with perfectly
noiseless step entered the room, knelt again--just where poor Lizzie had
knelt as she said her prayers--so that he might the more easily raise the
iron box without a struggle, and left the room with it in his arms without
disturbing the lovely sleeper. He then descended the stairs, passed into
the coffee-room at the bottom of them, and handed the box through an open
window to a man who was crouching on the outside in the dark. He then
followed the box, pulled down the window, put on a pair of boots which his
friend had ready for him; and the two, after lingering a few moments in
the shade of the dark wall, retreated with their prize round a corner. The
night itself was almost pitch-dark, and very wet. It was as nearly black
with darkness as a night can be. So far, the enterprising adventurers had
been successful, and we will now leave them in their chosen retreat,
engaged on the longer operation of forcing open the iron safe. For it had
been arranged between them that the iron safe should be opened then and
there. Though the weight to him who had taken it out of Lizzie's room had
not been oppressive, as it had oppressed the tall serving-man, it might
still have been an incumbrance to gentlemen intending to travel by railway
with as little observation as possible. They were, however, well supplied
with tools, and we will leave them at their work.

On the next morning Lizzie was awakened earlier than she had expected, and
found not only Patience Crabstick in her bedroom, but also a chambermaid,
and the wife of the manager of the hotel. The story was soon told to her.
Her room had been broken open, and her treasure was gone. The party had
intended to breakfast at their leisure, and proceed to London by a train
leaving Carlisle in the middle of the day; but they were soon disturbed
from their rest. Lady Eustace had hardly time to get her slippers from her
feet, and to wrap herself in her dressing-gown, to get rid of her
dishevelled nightcap, and make herself just fit for public view, before
the manager of the hotel, and Lord George, and the tall footman, and the
boots were in her bedroom. It was too plainly manifest to them all that
the diamonds were gone. The superintendent of the Carlisle police was
there almost as soon as the others; and following him very quickly came
the important gentleman who was at the head of the constabulary of the
county.

Lizzie, when she first heard the news, was awe-struck rather than
outwardly demonstrative of grief. "There has been a regular plot," said
Lord George. Captain Fitzmaurice, the gallant chief, nodded his head.

"Plot enough," said the superintendent, who did not mean to confide his
thoughts to any man, or to exempt any human being from his suspicion. The
manager of the hotel was very angry, and at first did not restrain his
anger. Did not everybody know that if articles of value were brought into
a hotel they should be handed over to the safe-keeping of the manager? He
almost seemed to think that Lizzie had stolen her own box of diamonds.

"My dear fellow," said Lord George, "nobody is saying a word against you
or your house."

"No, my lord; but----"

"Lady Eustace is not blaming you, and do not you blame anybody else," said
Lord George. "Let the police do what is right."

At last the men retreated, and Lizzie was left with Patience and Mrs.
Carbuncle. But even then she did not give way to her grief, but sat upon
the bed awe-struck and mute. "Perhaps I had better get dressed," she said
at last.

"I feared how it might be," said Mrs. Carbuncle, holding Lizzie's hand
affectionately.

"Yes; you said so."

"The prize was so great."

"I was always a-telling my lady----" began Crabstick.

"Hold your tongue!" said Lizzie angrily. "I suppose the police will do the
best they can, Mrs. Carbuncle?"

"Oh yes; and so will Lord George."

"I think I'll lie down again for a little while," said Lizzie. "I feel so
sick I hardly know what to do. If I were to lie down for a little I should
be better." With much difficulty she got them to leave her. Then, before
she again undressed herself, she bolted the door that still had a bolt,
and turned the lock in the other. Having done this, she took out from
under her pillow the little parcel which had been in her desk, and,
untying it, perceived that her dear diamond necklace was perfect, and
quite safe.

The enterprising adventurers had, indeed, stolen the iron case, but they
had stolen nothing else. The reader must not suppose that because Lizzie
had preserved her jewels, she was therefore a consenting party to the
abstraction of the box. The theft had been a genuine theft, planned with
great skill, carried out with much ingenuity, one in the perpetration of
which money had been spent, a theft which for a while baffled the police
of England, and which was supposed to be very creditable to those who had
been engaged in it. But the box, and nothing but the box, had fallen into
the hands of the thieves.

Lizzie's silence when the abstraction of the box was made known to her,
her silence as to the fact that the necklace was at that moment within the
grasp of her own fingers, was not at first the effect of deliberate fraud.
She was ashamed to tell them that she brought the box empty from Portray,
having the diamonds in her own keeping because she had feared that the box
might be stolen. And then it occurred to her, quick as thought could
flash, that it might be well that Mr. Camperdown should be made to believe
that they had been stolen. And so she kept her secret. The reflections of
the next half-hour told her how very great would now be her difficulties.
But, as she had not disclosed the truth at first, she could hardly
disclose it now.




CHAPTER XLV

THE JOURNEY TO LONDON


When we left Lady Eustace alone in her bedroom at the Carlisle hotel after
the discovery of the robbery, she had very many cares upon her mind. The
necklace was, indeed, safe under her pillow in the bed; but when all the
people were around her--her own friends, and the police, and they who were
concerned with the inn--she had not told them that it was so, but had
allowed them to leave her with the belief that the diamonds had gone with
the box. Even at this moment, as she knew well, steps were being taken to
discover the thieves, and to make public the circumstances of the robbery.
Already, no doubt, the fact that her chamber had been entered in the
night, and her jewel-box withdrawn, was known to the London police
officers. In such circumstances how could she now tell the truth? But it
might be that already had the thieves been taken. In that case would not
the truth be known, even though she should not tell it? Then she thought
for a while that she would get rid of the diamonds altogether, so that no
one should know aught of them. If she could only think of a place fit for
such purpose, she would so hide them that no human ingenuity could
discover them. Let the thieves say what they might, her word would, in
such case, be better than that of the thieves. She would declare that the
jewels had been in the box when the box was taken. The thieves would swear
that the box had been empty. She would appeal to the absence of the
diamonds, and the thieves--who would be known as thieves--would be
supposed, even by their own friends and associates, to have disposed of
the diamonds before they had been taken. There would be a mystery in all
this, and a cunning cleverness, the idea of which had in itself a certain
charm for Lizzie Eustace. She would have all the world at a loss. Mr.
Camperdown could do nothing further to harass her; and would have been, so
far, overcome. She would be saved from the feeling of public defeat in the
affair of the necklace, which would be very dreadful to her. Lord Fawn
might probably be again at her feet. And in all the fuss and rumour which
such an affair would make in London, there would be nothing of which she
need be ashamed. She liked the idea, and she had grown to be very sick of
the necklace.

But what should she do with it? It was, at this moment, between her
fingers beneath the pillow. If she were minded, and she thought she was so
minded, to get rid of it altogether, the sea would be the place. Could she
make up her mind absolutely to destroy so large a property, it would be
best for her to have recourse to "her own broad waves," as she called them
even to herself. It was within the "friendly depths of her own rock-girt
ocean" that she should find a grave for her great trouble. But now her
back was to the sea, and she could hardly insist on returning to Portray
without exciting a suspicion that might be fatal to her.

And then might it not be possible to get altogether quit of the diamonds
and yet to retain the power of future possession? She knew that she was
running into debt, and that money would, some day, be much needed. Her
acquaintance with Mr. Benjamin, the jeweller, was a fact often present to
her mind. She might not be able to get ten thousand pounds from Mr.
Benjamin; but if she could get eight, or six, or even five, how pleasant
would it be! If she could put away the diamonds for three or four years,
if she could so hide them that no human eyes could see them till she
should again produce them to the light, surely, after so long an interval,
they might be made available! But where should be found such hiding-place?
She understood well how great was the peril while the necklace was in her
own immediate keeping. Any accident might discover it, and if the
slightest suspicion were aroused, the police would come upon her with
violence and discover it. But surely there must be some such hiding-place,
if only she could think of it! Then her mind reverted to all the stories
she had ever heard of mysterious villainies. There must be some way of
accomplishing this thing, if she could only bring her mind to work upon it
exclusively. A hole dug deep into the ground; would not that be the place?
But then, where should the hole be dug? In what spot should she trust the
earth? If anywhere, it must be at Portray. But now she was going from
Portray to London. It seemed to her to be certain that she could dig no
hole in London that would be secret to herself. Nor could she trust
herself, during the hour or two that remained to her, to find such a hole
in Carlisle.

What she wanted was a friend; some one that she could trust. But she had
no such friend. She could not dare to give the jewels up to Lord George.
So tempted, would not any Corsair appropriate the treasure? And if, as
might be possible, she were mistaken about him and he was no Corsair, then
would he betray her to the police. She thought of all her dearest friends,
Frank Greystock, Mrs. Carbuncle, Lucinda, Miss Macnulty, even of Patience
Crabstick, but there was no friend whom she could trust. Whatever she did
she must do alone! She began to fear that the load of thought required
would be more than she could bear. One thing, however, was certain to her:
she could not now venture to tell them all that the necklace was in her
possession, and that the stolen box had been empty.

Thinking of all this, she went to sleep, still holding the packet tight
between her fingers, and in this position was awakened at about ten by a
knock at the door from her friend Mrs. Carbuncle. Lizzie jumped out of
bed, and admitted her friend, admitting also Patience Crabstick. "You had
better get up now, dear," said Mrs. Carbuncle. "We are all going to
breakfast." Lizzie declared herself to be so fluttered that she must have
her breakfast up-stairs. No one was to wait for her. Crabstick would go
down and fetch for her a cup of tea, and just a morsel of something to
eat.

"You can't be surprised that I shouldn't be quite myself," said Lizzie.

Mrs. Carbuncle's surprise did not run at all in that direction. Both Mrs.
Carbuncle and Lord George had been astonished to find how well she bore
her loss. Lord George gave her credit for real bravery. Mrs. Carbuncle--
suggested, in a whisper, that perhaps she regarded the theft as an easy
way out of a lawsuit.

"I suppose you know, George, they would have got it from her." Then Lord
George whistled, and, in another whisper, declared that, if the little
adventure had all been arranged by Lady Eustace herself with the view of
getting the better of Mr. Camperdown, his respect for that lady would be
very greatly raised.

"If," said Lord George, "it turns out that she has had a couple of bravos
in her pay, like an old Italian marquis, I shall think very highly of her
indeed." This had occurred before Mrs. Carbuncle came up to Lizzie's room;
but neither of them for a moment suspected that the necklace was still
within the hotel.

The box had been found, and a portion of the fragments were brought into
the room while the party were still at breakfast. Lizzie was not in the
room, but the news was at once taken up to her by Crabstick, together with
a pheasant's wing and some buttered toast. In a recess beneath an archway
running under the railroad, not distant from the hotel above a hundred and
fifty yards, the iron box had been found. It had been forced open, so said
the sergeant of police, with tools of the finest steel, peculiarly made
for such purpose. The sergeant of police was quite sure that the thing had
been done by London men who were at the very top of their trade. It was
manifest that nothing had been spared. Every motion of the party must have
been known to them, and probably one of the adventurers had travelled in
the same train with them. And the very doors of the bedroom in the hotel
had been measured by the man who had cut out the bolt. The sergeant of
police was almost lost in admiration; but the superintendent of police,
whom Lord George saw more than once, was discreet and silent. To the
superintendent of police it was by no means sure that Lord George himself
might not be fond of diamonds. Of a suspicion flying so delightfully high
as this, he breathed no word to any one; but simply suggested that he
should like to retain the companionship of one of the party. If Lady
Eustace could dispense with the services of the tall footman, the tall
footman might be found useful at Carlisle. It was arranged, therefore,
that the tall footman should remain; and the tall footman did remain,
though not with his own consent. The whole party, including Lady Eustace
herself and Patience Crabstick, were called upon to give their evidence to
the Carlisle magistrates before they could proceed to London. This Lizzie
did, having the necklace at that moment locked up in her desk at the inn.
The diamonds were supposed to be worth ten thousand pounds. There was to
be a lawsuit about them. She did not for a moment doubt that they were her
property. She had been very careful about the diamonds because of the
lawsuit. Fearing that Mr. Camperdown might wrest them from her possession,
she had caused the iron box to be made. She had last seen the diamonds on
the evening before her departure from Portray. She had then herself locked
them up, and she now produced the key. The lock was still so far uninjured
that the key would turn it. That was her evidence. Crabstick, with a good
deal of reticence, supported her mistress. She had seen the diamonds, no
doubt, but had not seen them often. She had seen them down at Portray, but
not for ever so long. Crabstick had very little to say about them; but the
clever superintendent was by no means sure that Crabstick did not know
more than she said. Mrs. Carbuncle and Lord George had also seen the
diamonds at Portray. There was no doubt whatever as to the diamonds having
been in the iron box; nor was there, said Lord George, any doubt but that
this special necklace had acquired so much public notice from the fact of
the threatened lawsuit, as might make its circumstances and value known to
London thieves. The tall footman was not examined, but was detained by the
police under a remand given by the magistrates.

Much information as to what had been done oozed out in spite of the
precautions of the discreet superintendent. The wires had been put into
operation in every direction, and it had been discovered that one man whom
nobody knew had left the down mail train at Annan, and another at
Dumfries. These men had taken tickets by the train leaving Carlisle
between four and five A.M., and were supposed to have been the two
thieves. It had been nearly seven before the theft had been discovered,
and by that time not only had the men reached the towns named, but had had
time to make their way back again or further on into Scotland. At any
rate, for the present, all trace of them was lost. The sergeant of police
did not doubt but that one of these men was making his way up to London
with the necklace in his pocket. This was told to Lizzie by Lord George;
and though she was awe-struck by the danger of her situation, she
nevertheless did feel some satisfaction in remembering that she and she
only held the key of the mystery. And then as to those poor thieves! What
must have been their consternation when they found, after all the labour
and perils of the night, that the box contained no diamonds--that the
treasure was not there, and that they were nevertheless bound to save
themselves by flight and stratagem from the hands of the police! Lizzie,
as she thought of this, almost pitied the poor thieves. What a
consternation there would be among the Camperdowns and the Garnetts, among
the Mopuses and Benjamins, when the news was heard in London. Lizzie
almost enjoyed it. As her mind went on making fresh schemes on the
subject, a morbid desire of increasing the mystery took possession of her.
She was quite sure that nobody knew her secret, and that nobody as yet
could even guess it. There was great danger, but there might be delight
and even profit if she could safely dispose of the jewels before suspicion
against herself should be aroused. She could understand that a rumour
should get to the police that the box had been empty, even if the thieves
were not taken; but such rumour would avail nothing if she could only
dispose of the diamonds. As she first thought of all this, the only plan
hitherto suggested to herself would require her immediate return to
Portray. If she were at Portray she could find a spot in which she could
bury the necklace. But she was obliged to allow herself now to be hurried
up to London. When she got into the train the little parcel was in her
desk, and the key of her desk was fastened round her neck.

They had secured a compartment for themselves from Carlisle to London, and
of course filled four seats. "As I am alive," said Lord George as soon as
the train had left the station, "that head policeman thinks that I am the
thief." Mrs. Carbuncle laughed. Lizzie protested that this was absurd.
Lucinda declared that such a suspicion would be vastly amusing. "It's a
fact," continued Lord George. "I can see it in the fellow's eye, and I
feel it to be a compliment. They are so very 'cute that they delight in
suspicions. I remember when the altar-plate was stolen from Barchester
cathedral some years ago, a splendid idea occurred to one of the police
that the bishop had taken it."

"Really?" asked Lizzie.

"Oh, yes--really. I don't doubt but that there is already a belief in some
of their minds that you have stolen your own diamonds for the sake of
getting the better of Mr. Camperdown."

"But what could I do with them if I had?" asked Lizzie.

"Sell them, of course. There is always a market for such goods."

"But who would buy them?"

"If you have been so clever, Lady Eustace, I'll find a purchaser for them.
One would have to go a good distance to do it--and there would be some
expense. But the thing could be done. Vienna, I should think, would be
about the place."

"Very well, then," said Lizzie. "You won't be surprised if I ask you to
take the journey for me." Then they all laughed, and were very much
amused. It was quite agreed among them that Lizzie bore her loss very
well.

"I shouldn't care the least for losing them," said Lizzie, "only that
Florian gave them to me. They have been such a vexation to me that to be
without them will be a comfort." Her desk had been brought into the
carriage, and was now used as a foot-stool in place of the box which was
gone.

They arrived at Mrs. Carbuncle's house in Hertford Street quite late,
between ten and eleven; but a note had been sent from Lizzie to her cousin
Frank's address from the Euston Square station by a commissionnaire.
Indeed, two notes were sent--one to the House of Commons, and the other to
the Grosvenor Hotel. "My necklace has been stolen. Come to me early to-
morrow at Mrs. Carbuncle's house, No.--Hertford Street." And he did come,
before Lizzie was up. Crabstick brought her mistress word that Mr.
Greystock was in the parlour soon after nine o'clock. Lizzie again hurried
on her clothes so that she might see her cousin, taking care as she did,
so that though her toilet might betray haste, it should not be other than
charming. And as she dressed she endeavoured to come to some conclusion.
Would it not be best for her that she should tell everything to her
cousin, and throw herself upon his mercy, trusting to his ingenuity to
extricate her from her difficulties? She had been thinking of her position
almost through the entire night, and had remembered that at Carlisle she
had committed perjury. She had sworn that the diamonds had been left by
her in the box. And should they be found with her, it might be that they
would put her in jail for stealing them. Little mercy could she expect
from Mr. Camperdown should she fall into that gentleman's hands! But
Frank, if she would even yet tell him everything honestly, might probably
save her.

"What is this about the diamonds?" he asked as soon as he saw her. She had
flown almost into his arms as though carried there by the excitement of
the moment. "You don't really mean that they have been stolen?"

"I do, Frank."

"On the journey?"

"Yes, Frank--at the inn at Carlisle."

"Box and all?" Then she told him the whole story--not the true story, but
the story as it was believed by all the world. She found it to be
impossible to tell him the true story. "And the box was broken open, and
left in the street?"

"Under an archway," said Lizzie.

"And what do the police think?"

"I don't know what they think. Lord George says that they believe he is
the thief."

"He knew of them," said Frank, as though he imagined that the suggestion
was not altogether absurd.

"Oh, yes--he knew of them."

"And what is to be done?"

"I don't know. I've sent for you to tell me." Then Frank averred that
information should be immediately given to Mr. Camperdown. He would
himself call on Mr. Camperdown, and would also see the head of the London
police. He did not doubt but that all the circumstances were already known
in London at the police office; but it might be well that he should see
the officer. He was acquainted with the gentleman, and might perhaps learn
something. Lizzie at once acceded, and Frank went direct to Mr.
Camperdown's offices.

"If I had lost ten thousand pounds in that way," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "I
think I should have broken my heart." Lizzie felt that her heart was
bursting rather than being broken, because the ten thousand pounds' worth
of diamonds was not really lost.




CHAPTER XLVI

LUCY MORRIS IN BROOK STREET


Lucy Morris went to Lady Linlithgow early in October, and was still with
Lady Linlithgow when Lizzie Eustace returned to London in January. During
these three months she certainly had not been happy. In the first place,
she had not once seen her lover. This had aroused no anger or suspicion in
her bosom against him, because the old countess had told her that she
would have no lover come to the house, and that, above all, she would not
allow a young man with whom she herself was connected to come in that
guise to her companion. "From all I hear," said Lady Linlithgow, "it's not
at all likely to be a match; and at any rate it can't go on here." Lucy
thought that she would be doing no more than standing up properly for her
lover by asserting her conviction that it would be a match; and she did
assert it bravely; but she made no petition for his presence, and bore
that trouble bravely. In the next place, Frank was not a satisfactory
correspondent. He did write to her occasionally; and he wrote also to the
old countess immediately on his return to town from Bobsborough a letter
which was intended as an answer to that which she had written to Mrs.
Greystock. What was said in that letter Lucy never knew; but she did know
that Frank's few letters to herself were not full and hearty--were not
such thorough-going love-letters as lovers write to each other when they
feel unlimited satisfaction in the work. She excused him, telling herself
that he was overworked, that with his double trade of legislator and
lawyer he could hardly be expected to write letters, that men, in respect
of letter-writing, are not as women are, and the like; but still there
grew at her heart a little weed of care, which from week to week spread
its noxious, heavy-scented leaves, and robbed her of her joyousness. To be
loved by her lover, and to feel that she was his, to have a lover of her
own to whom she could thoroughly devote herself, to be conscious that she
was one of those happy women in the world who find a mate worthy of
worship as well as love--this to her was so great a joy that even the
sadness of her present position could not utterly depress her. From day to
day she assured herself that she did not doubt and would not doubt-that
there was no cause for doubt; that she would herself be base were she to
admit any shadow of suspicion. But yet his absence, and the shortness of
those little notes, which came perhaps once a fortnight, did tell upon her
in opposition to her own convictions. Each note as it came was answered--
instantly; but she would not write except when the notes came. She would
not seem to reproach him by writing oftener than he wrote. When he had
given her so much, and she had nothing but her confidence to give in
return, would she stint him in that? There can be no love, she said,
without confidence, and it was the pride of her heart to love him.

The circumstances of her present life were desperately weary to her. She
could hardly understand why it was that Lady Linlithgow should desire her
presence. She was required to do nothing. She had no duties to perform,
and, as it seemed to her, was of no use to any one. The countess would not
even allow her to be of ordinary service in the house. Lady Linlithgow, as
she had said of herself, poked her own fires, carved her own meat, lit her
own candles, opened and shut the doors for herself, wrote her own letters,
and did not even like to have books read to her. She simply chose to have
some one sitting with her to whom she could speak and make little cross-
grained, sarcastic, and ill-natured remarks. There was no company at the
house in Brook Street, and when the countess herself went out, she went
out alone. Even when she had a cab to go shopping, or to make calls, she
rarely asked Lucy to go with her; and was benevolent chiefly in this--that
if Lucy chose to walk round the square or as far as the park, her
ladyship's maid was allowed to accompany her for protection. Poor Lucy
often told herself that such a life would be unbearable, were it not for
the supreme satisfaction she had in remembering her lover. And then the
arrangement had been made only for six months. She did not feel quite
assured of her fate at the end of those six months, but she believed that
there would come to her a residence in a sort of outer garden to that
sweet Elysium in which she was to pass her life. The Elysium would be
Frank's house; and the outer garden was the deanery at Bobsborough.

Twice during the three months Lady Fawn, with two of the girls, came to
call upon her. On the first occasion she was unluckily out, taking
advantage of the protection of her ladyship's maid in getting a little
air. Lady Linlithgow had also been away, and Lady Fawn had seen no one.
Afterwards, both Lucy and her ladyship were found at home, and Lady Fawn
was full of graciousness and affection. "I dare say you've got something
to say to each other," said Lady Linlithgow, "and I'll go away."

"Pray don't let us disturb you," said Lady Fawn.

"You'd only abuse me if I didn't," said Lady Linlithgow.

As soon as she was gone Lucy rushed into her friend's arms. "It is so nice
to see you again!"

"Yes, my dear, isn't it? I did come before, you know."

"You have been so good to me! To see you again is like the violets and
primroses." She was crouching close to Lady Fawn, with her hand in that of
her friend Lydia. "I haven't a word to say against Lady Linlithgow, but it
is like winter here, after dear Richmond."

"Well, we think we're prettier at Richmond," said Lady Fawn.

"There were such hundreds of things to do there," said Lucy. "After all,
what a comfort it is to have things to do."

"Why did you come away?" said Lydia.

"Oh, I was obliged. You mustn't scold me now that you have come to see
me."

There were a hundred things to be said about Fawn Court and the children,
and a hundred more things about Lady Linlithgow and Bruton Street. Then,
at last, Lady Fawn asked the one important question. "And now, my dear,
what about Mr. Greystock?"

"Oh, I don't know; nothing particular, Lady Fawn. It's just as it was, and
I am--quite satisfied."

"You see him sometimes?"

"No, never. I have not seen him since the last time he came down to
Richmond. Lady Linlithgow doesn't allow--followers." There was a pleasant
little spark of laughter in Lucy's eye as she said this, which would have
told to any bystander the whole story of the affection which existed
between her and Lady Fawn.

"That's very ill-natured," said Lydia.

"And he's a sort of a cousin, too," said Lady Fawn.

"That's just the reason why," said Lucy, explaining. "Of course Lady
Linlithgow thinks that her sister's nephew can do better than marry her
companion. It's a matter of course she should think so. What I am most
afraid of is that the dean and Mrs. Greystock should think so too."

No doubt the dean and Mrs. Greystock would think so. Lady Fawn was very
sure of that. Lady Fawn was one of the best women breathing, unselfish,
motherly, affectionate, appreciative, and never happy unless she was doing
good to somebody. It was her nature to be soft, and kind, and beneficent.
But she knew very well that if she had had a son, a second son, situated
as was Frank Greystock, she would not wish him to marry a girl without a
penny, who was forced to earn her bread by being a governess. The
sacrifice on Mr. Greystock's part would, in her estimation, be so great,
that she did not believe that it would be made. Womanlike, she regarded
the man as being so much more important than the woman that she could not
think that Frank Greystock would devote himself simply to such a one as
Lucy Morris. Had Lady Fawn been asked which was the better creature of the
two, her late governess or the rising barrister who had declared himself
to be that governess's lover, she would have said that no man could be
better than Lucy. She knew Lucy's worth and goodness so well that she was
ready herself to do any act of friendship on behalf of one so sweet and
excellent. For herself and her girls Lucy was a companion and friend in
every way satisfactory. But was it probable that a man of the world, such
as was Frank Greystock, a rising man, a member of Parliament, one who, as
everybody knew, was especially in want of money--was it probable that such
a man as this would make her his wife just because she was good, and
worthy, and sweet-natured? No doubt the man had said that he would do so,
and Lady Fawn's fears betrayed on her ladyship's part a very bad opinion
of men in general. It may seem to be a paradox to assert that such bad
opinion sprang from the high idea which she entertained of the importance
of men in general; but it was so. She had but one son, and of all her
children he was the least worthy; but he was more important to her than
all her daughters. Between her own girls and Lucy she hardly made any
difference; but when her son had chosen to quarrel with Lucy, it had been
necessary to send Lucy to eat her meals up-stairs. She could not believe
that Mr. Greystock should think so much of such a little girl as to marry
her. Mr. Greystock would no doubt behave very badly in not doing so; but
then men do so often behave very badly! And at the bottom of her heart she
almost thought that they might be excused for doing so. According to her
view of things, a man out in the world had so many things to think of, and
was so very important, that he could hardly be expected to act at all
times with truth and sincerity.

Lucy had suggested that the dean and Mrs. Greystock would dislike the
marriage, and upon that hint Lady Fawn spoke. "Nothing is settled, I
suppose, as to where you are to go when the six months are over?"

"Nothing as yet, Lady Fawn."

"They haven't asked you to go to Bobsborough?"

Lucy would have given the world not to blush as she answered, but she did
blush. "Nothing is fixed, Lady Fawn."

"Something should be fixed, Lucy. It should be settled by this time,
shouldn't it, dear? What will you do without a home, if at the end of the
six months Lady Linlithgow should say that she doesn't want you any more?"

Lucy certainly did not look forward to a condition in which Lady
Linlithgow should be the arbitress of her destiny. The idea of staying
with the countess was almost as bad to her as that of finding herself
altogether homeless. She was still blushing, feeling herself to be hot and
embarrassed. But Lady Fawn sat waiting for an answer. To Lucy there was
only one answer possible. "I will ask Mr. Greystock what I am to do." Lady
Fawn shook her head. "You don't believe in Mr. Greystock, Lady Fawn; but I
do."

"My darling girl," said her ladyship, making the special speech for the
sake of making which she had travelled up from Richmond, "it is not
exactly a question of belief, but one of common prudence. No girl should
allow herself to depend on a man before she is married to him. By doing so
she will be apt to lose even his respect."

"I didn't mean for money," said Lucy, hotter than ever, with her eyes full
of tears.

"She should not be in any respect at his disposal till he has bound
himself to her at the altar. You may believe me, Lucy, when I tell you so.
It is only because I love you so that I say so."

"I know that, Lady Fawn."

"When your time here is over, just put up your things and come back to
Richmond. You need fear nothing with us. Frederic quite liked your way of
parting with him at last, and all that little affair is forgotten. At Fawn
Court you'll be safe; and you shall be happy, too, if we can make you
happy. It's the proper place for you."

"Of course you'll come," said Diana Fawn.

"You'll be the worst little thing in the world if you don't," said Lydia.
"We don't know what to do without you. Do we, mamma?"

"Lucy will please us all by coming back to her old home," said Lady Fawn.
The tears were now streaming down Lucy's face, so that she was hardly able
to say a word in answer to all this kindness. And she did not know what
word to say. Were she to accept the offer made to her, and acknowledge
that she could do nothing better than creep back under her old friend's
wing, would she not thereby be showing that she doubted her lover? But she
could not go to the dean's house unless the dean and his wife were pleased
to take her; and, suspecting as she did that they would not be pleased,
would it become her to throw upon her lover the burden of finding for her
a home with people who did not want her? Had she been welcome at
Bobsborough, Mrs. Greystock would surely have so told her before this.
"You needn't say a word, my dear," said Lady Fawn. "You'll come, and
there's an end of it."

"But you don't want me any more," said Lucy from amid her sobs.

"That's just all that you know about it," said Lydia. "We do want you--
more than anything."

"I wonder whether I may come in now," said Lady Linlithgow, entering the
room. As it was the countess's own drawing-room, as it was now mid-winter,
and as the fire in the dining-room had been allowed, as was usual, to sink
almost to two hot coals, the request was not unreasonable. Lady Fawn was
profuse in her thanks, and immediately began to account for Lucy's tears,
pleading their dear friendship and their long absence, and poor Lucy's
emotional state of mind. Then she took her leave, and Lucy, as soon as she
had been kissed by her friends outside the drawing-room door, took herself
to her bedroom and finished her tears in the cold.

"Have you heard the news?" said Lady Linlithgow to her companion about a
month after this. Lady Linlithgow had been out, and asked the question
immediately on her return. Lucy, of course, had heard no news. "Lizzie
Eustace has just come back to London, and has had all her jewels stolen on
the road."

"The diamonds?" asked Lucy with amaze.

"Yes, the Eustace diamonds! And they didn't belong to her any more than
they did to you. They've been taken any way, and from what I hear I
shouldn't be at all surprised if she had arranged the whole matter
herself."

"Arranged that they should be stolen?"

"Just that, my dear. It would be the very thing for Lizzie Eustace to do.
She's clever enough for anything."

"But, Lady Linlithgow----"

"I know all about that. Of course it would be very wicked, and if it were
found out she'd be put in the dock and tried for her life. It is just what
I expect she'll come to some of these days. She has gone and got up a
friendship with some disreputable people, and was travelling with them.
There was a man who calls himself Lord George de Bruce Carruthers. I know
him, and can remember when he was errand boy to a disreputable lawyer at
Aberdeen." This assertion was a falsehood on the part of the countess.
Lord George had never been an errand boy, and the Aberdeen lawyer--as
provincial Scotch lawyers go--had been by no means disreputable. "I'm told
that the police think that he has got them."

"How very dreadful!"

"Yes; it's dreadful enough. At any rate, men got into Lizzie's room at
night and took away the iron box and diamonds, and all. It may be she was
asleep at the time; but she's one of those who pretty nearly always sleep
with one eye open."

"She can't be so bad as that, Lady Linlithgow."

"Perhaps not. We shall see. They had just begun a lawsuit about the
diamonds, to get them back. And then all at once they're stolen. It looks
what the men call--fishy. I'm told that all the police in London are up
about it."

On the very next day who should come to Brook Street but Lizzie Eustace
herself. She and her aunt had quarrelled, and they hated each other; but
the old woman had called upon Lizzie, advising her, as the reader will
perhaps remember, to give up the diamonds, and now Lizzie returned the
visit. "So you're here, installed in poor Macnulty's place," began Lizzie
to her old friend, the countess at the moment being out of the room.

"I am staying with your aunt for a few months as her companion. Is it
true, Lizzie, that all your diamonds have been stolen?" Lizzie gave an
account of the robbery, true in every respect except in regard to the
contents of the box. Poor Lizzie had been wronged in that matter by the
countess, for the robbery had been quite genuine. The man had opened her
room and taken her box, and she had slept through it all. And then the
broken box had been found, and was in the hands of the police, and was
evidence of the fact.

"People seem to think it possible," said Lizzie, "that Mr. Camperdown the
lawyer arranged it all." As this suggestion was being made, Lady
Linlithgow came in, and then Lizzie repeated the whole story of the
robbery. Though the aunt and niece were open and declared enemies, the
present circumstances were so peculiar and full of interest that
conversation for a time almost amicable took place between them. "As the
diamonds were so valuable, I thought it right, Aunt Susanna, to come and
tell you myself."

"It's very good of you, but I'd heard it already. I was telling Miss
Morris yesterday what very odd things there are being said about it."

"Weren't you very much frightened?" asked Lucy.

"You see, my child, I knew nothing about it till it was all over. The man
cut the bit out of the door in the most beautiful way, without my ever
hearing the least sound of the saw."

"And you that sleep so light," said the countess.

"They say that perhaps something was put into the wine at dinner to make
me sleep."

"Ah!" ejaculated the countess, who did not for a moment give up her own
erroneous suspicion; "very likely."

"And they do say these people can do things without making the slightest
tittle of noise. At any rate the box was gone."

"And the diamonds?" asked Lucy.

"Oh yes, of course. And now there is such a fuss about it! The police keep
on coming to me almost every day."

"And what do the police think?" asked Lady Linlithgow. "I am told that
they have their suspicions."

"No doubt they have their suspicions," said Lizzie.

"You travelled up with friends, I suppose."

"Oh yes, with Lord George de Bruce Carruthers; and with Mrs. Carbuncle,
who is my particular friend, and with Lucinda Roanoke, who is just going
to be married to Sir Griffin Tewett. We were quite a large party."

"And Macnulty?"

"No. I left Miss Macnulty at Portray with my darling. They thought he had
better remain a little longer in Scotland."

"Ah, yes; perhaps Lord George de Bruce Carruthers does not care for
babies. I can easily believe that. I wish Macnulty had been with you."

"Why do you wish that?" said Lizzie, who already was beginning to feel
that the countess intended, as usual, to make herself disagreeable.

"She's a stupid, dull, pig-headed creature; but one can believe what she
says."

"And don't you believe what I say?" demanded Lizzie.

"It's all true, no doubt, that the diamonds are gone."

"Indeed it is."

"But I don't know much about Lord George de Bruce Carruthers."

"He's the brother of a marquis, anyway," said "Lizzie, who thought that
she might thus best answer the mother of a Scotch earl.

"I remember when he was plain George Carruthers, running about the streets
of Aberdeen, and it was well with him when his shoes weren't broken at the
toes and down at heel. He earned his bread then, such as it was. Nobody
knows how he gets it now. Why does he call himself de Bruce, I wonder?"

"Because his godfathers and godmothers gave him that name when he was made
a child of Christ, and an inheritor of the kingdom of Heaven," said
Lizzie, ever so pertly.

"I don't believe a bit of it."

"I wasn't there to see, Aunt Susanna; and therefore I can't swear to it.
That's his name in all the peerages, and I suppose they ought to know."

"And what does Lord George de Bruce say about the diamonds?"

Now it had come to pass that Lady Eustace herself did not feel altogether
sure that Lord George had not had a hand in this robbery. It would have
been a trick worthy of a genuine Corsair, to arrange and carry out such a
scheme for the appropriation of so rich a spoil. A watch or a brooch
would, of course, be beneath the notice of a good genuine Corsair--of a
Corsair who was written down in the peerage as a marquis's brother; but
diamonds worth ten thousand pounds are not to be had every day. A Corsair
must live, and if not by plunder rich as that, how then? If Lord George
had concocted this little scheme, he would naturally be ignorant of the
true event of the robbery till he should meet the humble executors of his
design, and would, as Lizzie thought, have remained' unaware of the truth
till his arrival in London. That he had been ignorant of the truth during
the journey was evident to her. But they had now been three days in
London, during which she had seen him once. At that interview he had been
sullen and almost cross, and had said next to nothing about the robbery.
He made but one remark about it. "I have told the chief man here," he
said, "that I shall be ready to give any evidence in my power when called
upon. Till then I shall take no further steps in the matter. I have been
asked questions that should not have been asked." In saying this he had
used a tone which prevented further conversation on the subject, but
Lizzie, as she thought of it all, remembered his jocular remark, made in
the railway carriage, as to the suspicion which had already been expressed
on the matter in regard to himself. If he had been the perpetrator, and
had then found that he had only stolen the box, how wonderful would be the
mystery!

"He hasn't got anything to say," replied Lizzie to the question of the
countess.

"And who is your Mrs. Carbuncle?" asked the old woman.

"A particular friend of mine with whom I am staying at present. You don't
go about a great deal, Aunt Linlithgow, but surely you must have met Mrs.
Carbuncle."

"I'm an ignorant old woman, no doubt. My dear, I'm not at all surprised at
your losing your diamonds. The pity is that they weren't your own."

"They were my own."

"The loss will fall on you, no doubt, because the Eustace people will make
you pay for them. You'll have to give up half your jointure for your life.
That's what it will come to. To think of your travelling about with those
things in a box!"

"They were my own, and I had a right to do what I liked with them. Nobody
accuses you of taking them."

"That's quite true. Nobody will accuse me. I suppose Lord George has left
England for the benefit of his health. It would not at all surprise me if
I were to hear that Mrs. Carbuncle had followed him; not in the least."

"You're just like yourself, Aunt Susanna," said Lizzie, getting up and
taking her leave. "Good-by, Lucy. I hope you're happy and comfortable
here. Do you ever see a certain friend of ours now?"

"If you mean Mr. Greystock, I haven't seen him since I left Fawn Court,"
said Lucy, with dignity.

When Lizzie was gone Lady Linlithgow spoke her mind freely about her
niece. "Lizzie Eustace won't come to any good. When I heard that she was
engaged to that prig, Lord Fawn, I had some hopes that she might be kept
out of harm. That's all over, of course. When he heard about the necklace
he wasn't going to put his neck into that scrape. But now she's getting
among such a set that nothing can save her. She has taken to hunting, and
rides about the country like a madwoman."

"A great many ladies hunt," said Lucy.

"And she's got hold of this Lord George, and of that horrid American woman
that nobody knows anything about. They've got the diamonds between them, I
don't doubt. I'll bet you sixpence that the police find out all about it,
and that there is some terrible scandal. The diamonds were no more hers
than they were mine, and she'll be made to pay for them."

The necklace, then meanwhile, was still locked up in Lizzie's desk--with a
patent Bramah key--in Mrs. Carbuncle's house, and was a terrible trouble
to our unhappy friend.




CHAPTER XLVII

MATCHING PRIORY


Before the end of January everybody in London had heard of the great
robbery at Carlisle; and most people had heard also that there was
something very peculiar in the matter--something more than a robbery.
Various rumours were afloat. It had become widely known that the diamonds
were to be the subject of litigation between the young widow and the
trustees of the Eustace estate; and it was known also that Lord Fawn had
engaged himself to marry the widow, and had then retreated from his
engagement simply on account of this litigation. There were strong parties
formed in the matter; whom we may call Lizzieites and Antilizzieites. The
Lizzieites were of opinion that poor Lady Eustace was being very ill-
treated--that the diamonds did probably belong to her, and that Lord Fawn,
at any rate, clearly ought to be her own. It was worthy of remark that
these Lizzieites were all of them Conservatives. Frank Greystock had
probably set the party on foot; and it was natural that political
opponents should believe that a noble young Under-Secretary of State on
the Liberal side--such as Lord Fawn--had misbehaved himself. When the
matter at last became of such importance as to demand leading articles in
the newspapers, those journals which had devoted themselves to upholding
the conservative politicians of the day were very heavy indeed upon Lord
Fawn. The whole force of the Government, however, was Antilizzieite; and
as the controversy advanced, every good Liberal became aware that there
was nothing so wicked, so rapacious, so bold, or so cunning but that Lady
Eustace might have done it, or caused it to be done, without delay,
without difficulty, and without scruple. Lady Glencora Palliser for a
while endeavoured to defend Lizzie in Liberal circles--from generosity
rather than from any real belief, and instigated, perhaps, by a feeling
that any woman in society who was capable of doing anything extraordinary
ought to be defended. But even Lady Glencora was forced to abandon her
generosity, and to confess, on behalf of her party, that Lizzie Eustace
was--a very wicked young woman indeed. All this, no doubt, grew out of the
diamonds, and chiefly arose from the robbery; but there had been enough of
notoriety attached to Lizzie before the affair at Carlisle to make people
fancy that they had understood her character long before that.

The party assembled at Matching Priory, a country house belonging to Mr.
Palliser, in which Lady Glencora took much delight, was not large, because
Mr. Palliser's uncle, the Duke of Omnium, who was with them, was now a
very old man, and one who did not like very large gatherings of people.
Lord and Lady Chiltern were there--that Lord Chiltern who had been known
so long and so well in the hunting counties of England, and that Lady
Chiltern who had been so popular in London as the beautiful Violet
Effingham; and Mr. and Mrs. Grey were there, very particular friends of
Mr. Palliser's. Mr. Grey was now sitting for the borough of Silverbridge,
in which the Duke of Omnium was still presumed to have a controlling
influence, in spite of all Reform bills, and Mrs. Grey was in some distant
way connected with Lady Glencora. And Madame Max Goesler was there--a lady
whose society was still much affected by the old duke; and Mr. and Mrs.
Bonteen--who had been brought there, not perhaps altogether because they
were greatly loved, but in order that the gentleman's services might be
made available by Mr. Palliser in reference to some great reform about to
be introduced in monetary matters. Mr. Palliser, who was now Chancellor of
the Exchequer, was intending to alter the value of the penny. Unless the
work should be too much for him, and he should die before he had
accomplished the self-imposed task, the future penny was to be made, under
his auspices, to contain five farthings, and the shilling ten pennies. It
was thought that if this could be accomplished, the arithmetic of the
whole world would be so simplified that henceforward the name of Palliser
would be blessed by all schoolboys, clerks, shopkeepers, and financiers.
But the difficulties were so great that Mr. Palliser's hair was already
grey from toil, and his shoulders bent by the burden imposed upon them.
Mr. Bonteen, with two private secretaries from the Treasury, was now at
Matching to assist Mr. Palliser; and it was thought that both Mr. and Mrs.
Bonteen were near to madness under the pressure of the five-farthing
penny. Mr. Bonteen had remarked to many of his political friends that
those two extra farthings that could not be made to go into the shilling
would put him into his cold grave before the world would know what he had
done--or had rewarded him for it with a handle to his name, and a pension.
Lord Fawn was also at Matching--a suggestion having been made to Lady
Glencora by some leading Liberals that he should be supported in his
difficulties by her hospitality.

The mind of Mr. Palliser himself was too deeply engaged to admit of its
being interested in the great necklace affair; but, of all the others
assembled, there was not one who did not listen anxiously for news on the
subject. As regarded the old duke, it had been found to be quite a
godsend; and from post to post as the facts reached Matching they were
communicated to him. And, indeed, there were some there who would not wait
for the post, but had the news about poor Lizzie's diamonds down by the
wires. The matter was of the greatest moment to Lord Fawn, and Lady
Glencora was perhaps justified, on his behalf, in demanding a preference
for her affairs over the messages which were continually passing between
Matching and the Treasury respecting those two ill-conditioned farthings.

"Duke," she said, entering rather abruptly the small, warm, luxurious room
in which her husband's uncle was passing the morning--"Duke, they say now
that after all the diamonds were not in the box when it was taken out of
the room at Carlisle." The duke was reclining in an easy-chair, with his
head leaning forward on his breast, and Madame Goesler was reading to him.
It was now three o'clock, and the old man had been brought down to this
room after his breakfast. Madame Goesler was reading the last famous new
novel, and the duke was dozing. That, probably, was the fault neither of
the reader nor of the novelist, as the duke was wont to doze in these
days. But Lady Glencora's tidings awakened him completely. She had the
telegram in her hand--so that he could perceive that the very latest news
was brought to him.

"The diamonds not in the box!" he said--pushing his head a little more
forward in his eagerness, and sitting with the extended fingers of his two
hands touching each other.

"Barrington Erle says that Major Mackintosh is almost sure the diamonds
were not there." Major Mackintosh was an officer very high in the police
force, whom everybody trusted implicitly, and as to whom the outward world
believed that he could discover the perpetrators of any iniquity, if he
would only take the trouble to look into it. Such was the pressing nature
of his duties that he found himself compelled in one way or another to
give up about sixteen hours a day to them; but the outer world accused him
of idleness. There was nothing he couldn't find out--only he would not
give himself the trouble to find out all the things that happened. Two or
three newspapers had already been very hard upon him in regard to the
Eustace diamonds. Such a mystery as that, they said, he ought to have
unravelled long ago. That he had not unravelled it yet was quite certain.

"The diamonds not in the box!" said the duke.

"Then she must have known it," said Madame Goesler.

"That doesn't quite follow, Madame Max," said Lady Glencora.

"But why shouldn't the diamonds have been in the box?" asked the duke. As
this was the first intimation given to Lady Glencora of any suspicion that
the diamonds had not been taken with the box, and as this had been
received by telegraph, she could not answer the duke's question with any
clear exposition of her own. She put up her hands and shook her head.
"What does Plantagenet think about it?" asked the duke. Plantagenet
Palliser was the full name of the duke's nephew and heir. The duke's mind
was evidently much disturbed.

"He doesn't think that either the box or the diamonds were ever worth five
farthings," said Lady Glencora.

"The diamonds not in the box!" repeated the duke. "Madame Max, do you
believe that the diamonds were not in the box?" Madame Goesler shrugged
her shoulders and made no answer; but the shrugging of her shoulders was
quite satisfactory to the duke, who always thought that Madame Goesler did
everything better than anybody else. Lady Glencora stayed with her uncle
for the best part of an hour, and every word spoken was devoted to Lizzie
and her necklace; but as this new idea had been broached, and as they had
no other information than that conveyed in the telegram, very little light
could be thrown upon it. But on the next morning there came a letter from
Barrington Erie to Lady Glencora, which told so much, and hinted so much
more, that it will be well to give it to the reader.

"TRAVELLERS', 29 Jan., 186-.

"MY DEAR LADY GLENCORA: I hope you got my telegram yesterday. I had just
seen Mackintosh, on whose behalf, however, I must say that he told me as
little as he possibly could. It is leaking out, however, on every side,
that the police believe that when the box was taken out of the room at
Carlisle, the diamonds were not in it. As far as I can learn, they ground
this suspicion on the fact that they cannot trace the stones. They say
that, if such a lot of diamonds had been through the thieves' market in
London, they would have left some track behind them. As far as I can
judge, Mackintosh thinks that Lord George has them, but that her ladyship
gave them to him; and that this little game of the robbery at Carlisle was
planned to put John Eustace and the lawyers off the scent. If it should
turn out that the box was opened before it left Portray, that the door of
her ladyship's room was cut by her ladyship's self, or by his lordship
with her ladyship's aid, and that the fragments of the box were carried
out of the hotel by his lordship in person, it will altogether have been
so delightful a plot, that all concerned in it ought to be canonised or at
least allowed to keep their plunder. An old detective told me that the
opening of the box under the arch of the railway, in an exposed place,
could hardly have been executed so neatly as was done; that no thief so
situated would have given the time necessary to it; and that, if there had
been thieves at all at work, they would have been traced. Against this,
there is the certain fact, as I have heard from various men engaged in the
inquiry, that certain persons among the community of thieves are very much
at loggerheads with each other, the higher, or creative department in
thiefdom, accusing the lower or mechanical department of gross treachery
in having appropriated to its own sole profit plunder, for the taking of
which it had undertaken to receive a certain stipulated price. But then it
may be the case that his lordship and her ladyship have set such a rumour
abroad for the sake of putting the police off the scent. Upon the whole,
the little mystery is quite delightful; and has put the ballot, and poor
Mr. Palliser's five-farthinged penny, quite out of joint. Nobody now cares
for anything except the Eustace diamonds. Lord George, I am told, has
offered to fight everybody or anybody, beginning with Lord Fawn and ending
with Major Mackintosh. Should he be innocent, which of course is possible,
the thing must be annoying. I should not at all wonder myself if it should
turn out that her ladyship left them in Scotland. The place there,
however, has been searched, in compliance with an order from the police
and by her ladyship's consent.

"Don't let Mr. Palliser quite kill himself. I hope the Bonteen plan
answers. I never knew a man who could find more farthings in a shilling
that. Mr. Bonteen, Remember me very kindly to the duke, and pray enable
poor Fawn to keep up his spirits. If he likes to arrange a meeting with
Lord George, I shall be only too happy to be his friend. You remember our
last duel. Chiltern is with you, and can put Fawn up to the proper way of
getting over to Flanders, and of returning, should he chance to escape.

"Yours always most faithfully,

"BARRINGTON ERLE

"Of course I'll keep you posted in everything respecting the necklace till
you come to town yourself."

The whole of this letter Lady Glencora read to the duke, to Lady Chiltern,
and to Madame Goesler; and the principal contents of it she repeated to
the entire company. It was certainly the general belief at Matching that
Lord George had the diamonds in his possession, either with or without the
assistance of their late fair possessor.

The duke was struck with awe when he thought of all the circumstances.
"The brother of a marquis!" he said to his nephew's wife. "It's such a
disgrace to the peerage!"

"As for that, duke," said Lady Glencora, "the peerage is used to it by
this time."

"I never-heard of such an affair as this before."

"I don't see why the brother of a marquis shouldn't turn thief as well as
anybody else. They say he hasn't got anything of his own; and I suppose
that is what makes men steal other people's property. Peers go into trade,
and peeresses gamble on the Stock Exchange. Peers become bankrupt, and the
sons of peers run away, just like other men. I don't see why all
enterprises should not be open to them. But to think of that little
purring cat, Lady Eustace, having been so very-very clever! It makes me
quite envious."

All this took place in the morning--that is,--about two o'clock; but after
dinner the subject became general. There might be some little reticence in
regard to Lord Fawn's feelings, but it was not sufficient to banish a
subject so interesting from the minds and lips of the company. "The Tewett
marriage is to come off, after all," said Mrs. Bonteen. "I've a letter
from dear Mrs. Rutter, telling me so as a fact."

"I wonder whether Miss Roanoke will be allowed to wear one or two of the
diamonds at the wedding," suggested one of the private secretaries.

"Nobody will dare to wear a diamond at all next season," said Lady
Glencora. "As for my own, I sha'n't think of having them out. I should
always feel that I was being inspected."

"Unless they unravel the mystery," said Madame Goesler.

"I hope they won't do that," said Lady Glencora. "The play is too good to
come to an end so soon. If we hear that Lord George is engaged to Lady
Eustace, nothing, I suppose, can be done to stop the marriage."

"Why shouldn't she marry if she pleases?" asked Mr. Palliser.

"I've not the slightest objection to her being married. I hope she will,
with all my heart. I certainly think she should have her husband after
buying him at such a price. I suppose Lord Fawn won't forbid the banns."
These last words were only whispered to her next neighbour, Lord Chiltern;
but poor Lord Fawn saw the whisper, and was aware that it must have had
reference to his condition.

On the next morning there came further news. The police had asked
permission from their occupants to search the rooms in which lived Lady
Eustace and Lord George, and in each case the permission had been refused.
So said Barrington Erle in his letter to Lady Glencora. Lord George had
told the applicant, very roughly, that nobody should touch an article
belonging to him without a search-warrant. If any magistrate would dare to
give such a warrant, let him do it. "I'm told that Lord George acts the
indignant madman uncommonly well," said Barrington Erle in his letter. As
for poor Lizzie, she had fainted when the proposition was made to her. The
request was renewed as soon as she had been brought to herself; and then
she refused, on the advice, as she said, of her cousin, Mr. Grey stock.
Barrington Erie went on to say that the police were very much blamed. It
was believed that no information could be laid before a magistrate
sufficient to justify a search-warrant; and, in such circumstances, no
search should have been attempted. Such was the public verdict, as
declared in Barrington Erle's last letter to Lady Glencora.

Mr. Palliser was of opinion that the attempt to search the lady's house
was iniquitous. Mr. Bonteen shook his head, and rather thought that, if he
were Home Secretary, he would have had the search made. Lady Chiltern said
that if policemen came to her, they might search everything she had in the
world. Mrs. Grey reminded them that all they really knew of the
unfortunate woman was that her jewel-box had been stolen out of her
bedroom at her hotel. Madame Goesler was of opinion that a lady who could
carry such a box about the country with her deserved to have it stolen.
Lord Fawn felt himself obliged to confess that he agreed altogether with
Madame Goesler. Unfortunately, he had been acquainted with the lady, and
now was constrained to say that her conduct had been such as to justify
the suspicions of the police.

"Of course we all suspect her," said Lady Glencora, "and of course we
suspect Lord George too; and Mrs. Carbuncle and Miss Roanoke. But then,
you know, if I were to lose my diamonds, people would suspect me just the
same, or perhaps Plantagenet. It is so delightful to think that a woman
has stolen her own property, and put all the police into a state of
ferment."

Lord Chiltern declared himself to be heartily sick of the whole subject;
and Mr. Grey, who was a very just man, suggested that the evidence, as
yet, against anybody, was very slight.

"Of course it's slight," said Lady Glencora. "If it were more than slight,
it would be just like any other robbery, and there would be nothing in
it."

On the same morning Mrs. Bonteen received a second letter from her friend
Mrs. Rutter. The Tewett marriage had been certainly broken off. Sir
Griffin had been very violent, misbehaving himself grossly in Mrs.
Carbuncle's house, and Miss Roanoke had declared that under no
circumstances would she ever speak to him again. It was Mrs. Rutter's
opinion, however, that this violence had been "put on" by Sir Griffin, who
was desirous of escaping from the marriage because of the affair of the
diamonds.

"He's very much bound up with Lord George," said Mrs. Rutter, "and is
afraid that he may be implicated."

"In my opinion he's quite right," said Lord Fawn.

All these matters were told to the duke by Lady Glencora and Madame
Goesler in the recesses of his grace's private room; for the duke was now
infirm, and did not dine in company unless the day was very auspicious to
him. But in the evening he would creep into the drawing-room, and on this
occasion he had a word to say about the Eustace diamonds to every one in
the room. It was admitted by them all that the robbery had been a godsend
in the way of amusing the duke.

"Wouldn't have her boxes searched, you know," said the duke. "That looks
uncommonly suspicious. Perhaps, Lady Chiltern, we shall hear to-morrow
morning something more about it."

"Poor dear duke," said Lady Chiltern to her husband.

"Doting old idiot!" he replied.




CHAPTER XLVIII

LIZZIE'S CONDITION


When such a man as Barrington Erle undertakes to send information to such
a correspondent as Lady Glencora in reference to such a matter as Lady
Eustace's diamonds, he is bound to be full rather than accurate. We may
say, indeed, that perfect accuracy would be detrimental rather than
otherwise, and would tend to disperse that feeling of mystery which is so
gratifying. No suggestion had in truth been made to Lord George de Bruce
Carruthers as to the searching of his lordship's boxes and desks. That
very eminent detective officer, Mr. Bunfit, had, however, called upon Lord
George more than once, and Lord George had declared very plainly that he
did not like it.

"If you'll have the kindness to explain to me what it is you want, I'll be
much obliged to you," Lord George had said to Mr. Bunfit.

"Well, my lord," said Bunfit, "what we want is these diamonds."

"Do you believe that I've got them?"

"A man in my situation, my lord, never believes anything. "We has to
suspect, but we never believes."

"You suspect that I stole them?"

"No, my lord; I didn't say that. But things are very queer; aren't they?"
The immediate object of Mr. Bunfit's visit on this morning had been to
ascertain from Lord George whether it was true that his lordship had been
with Messrs. Harter & Benjamin, the jewellers, on the morning after his
arrival in town. No one from the police had as yet seen either Harter or
Benjamin in connection with this robbery; but it may not be too much to
say that the argus eyes of Major Mackintosh were upon Messrs. Harter &
Benjamin's whole establishment, and it was believed that if the jewels
were in London they were locked up in some box within that house. It was
thought more than probable by Major Mackintosh and his myrmidons that the
jewels were already at Hamburg; and by this time, as the major had
explained to Mr. Camperdown, every one of them might have been reset, or
even recut. But it was known that Lord George had been at the house of
Messrs. Harter & Benjamin early on the morning after his return to town,
and the ingenuous Mr. Bunfit, who, by reason of his situation, never
believed anything and only suspected, had expressed a very strong opinion
to Major Mackintosh that the necklace had in truth been transferred to the
Jews on that morning. That there was nothing "too hot or too heavy" for
Messrs. Harter & Benjamin, was quite a creed with the police of the west
end of London. Might it not be well to ask Lord George what he had to say
about the visit? Should Lord George deny the visit, such denial would go
far to confirm Mr. Bunfit. The question was asked, and Lord George did not
deny the visit.

"Unfortunately they hold acceptances of mine," said Lord George, "and I am
often there."

"We know as they have your lordship's name to paper," said Mr. Bunfit,
thanking Lord George, however, for his courtesy. It may be understood that
all this would be unpleasant to Lord George, and that he should be
indignant almost to madness.

But Mr. Erle's information, though certainly defective in regard to Lord
George de Bruce Carruthers, had been more correct when he spoke of the
lady. An interview that was very terrible to poor Lizzie did take place
between her and Mr. Bunfit in Mrs. Carbuncle's house on Tuesday the 3Oth
of January. There had been many interviews between Lizzie and various
members of the police force in reference to the diamonds, but the
questions put to her had always been asked on the supposition that she
might have mislaid the necklace. Was it not possible that she might have
thought that she locked it up, but have omitted to place it in the box? As
long as these questions had reference to a possible oversight in Scotland,
to some carelessness which she might have committed on the night before
she left her home, Lizzie upon the whole seemed rather to like the idea.
It certainly was possible. She believed thoroughly that the diamonds had
been locked by her in the box, but she acknowledged that it might be the
case that they had been left on one side. This had happened when the
police first began to suspect that the necklace had not been in the box
when it was carried out of the Carlisle hotel, but before it had occurred
to them that Lord George had been concerned in the robbery, and possibly
Lady Eustace herself. Men had been sent down from London, of course at
considerable expense, and Portray Castle had been searched, with the
consent of its owner, from the weathercock to the foundation-stone, much
to the consternation of Miss Macnulty and to the delight of Andy Gowran.
No trace of the diamonds was found, and Lizzie had so far fraternised with
the police. But when Mr. Bunfit called upon her, perhaps for the fifth or
sixth time, and suggested that he should be allowed, with the assistance
of the female whom he had left behind him in the hall, to search all her
ladyship's boxes, drawers, presses, and receptacles in London, the thing
took a very different aspect. "You see, my lady," said Mr. Bunfit,
excusing the peculiar nature of his request, "it may have got anywhere
among your ladyship's things unbeknownst." Lady Eustace and Mrs. Carbuncle
were at the time sitting together, and Mrs. Carbuncle was the first to
protest. If Mr. Bunfit thought that he was going to search her things, Mr.
Bunfit was very much mistaken. What she had suffered about this necklace
no man or woman knew, and she meant that there should be an end of it. It
was her opinion that the police should have discovered every stone of it
days and days ago. At any rate her house was her own, and she gave Mr.
Bunfit to understand that his repeated visits were not agreeable to her.
But when Mr. Bunfit, without showing the slightest displeasure at the evil
things said of him, suggested that the search should be confined to the
rooms used exclusively by Lady Eustace, Mrs. Carbuncle absolutely changed
her views, and recommended that he should be allowed to have his way.

At that moment the condition of poor Lizzie Eustace was very sad. He who
recounts these details has scorned to have a secret between himself and
his readers. The diamonds were at this moment locked up within Lizzie's
desk. For the last three weeks they had been there--if it may not be more
truly said that they were lying heavily on her heart. For three weeks had
her mind with constant stretch been working on that point--whither should
she take the diamonds, and what should she do with them? A certain very
wonderful strength she did possess, or she could not have endured the
weight of so terrible an anxiety; but from day to day the thing became
worse and worse with her, as gradually she perceived that suspicion was
attached to herself. Should she confide the secret to Lord George, or to
Mrs. Carbuncle, or to Frank Greystock? She thought she could have borne it
all if only some one would have borne it with her. But when the moments
came in which such confidence might be made, her courage failed her. Lord
George she saw frequently; but he was unsympathetic and almost rough with
her. She knew that he also was suspected, and she was almost disposed to
think that he had planned the robbery. If it were so, if the robbery had
been his handiwork, it was not singular that he should be unsympathetic
with the owner and probable holder of the prey which he had missed.
Nevertheless Lizzie thought that if he would have been soft with her, like
a dear, good, genuine Corsair, for half an hour, she would have told him
all, and placed the necklace in his hands. And there were moments in which
she almost resolved to tell her secret to Mrs. Carbuncle. She had stolen
nothing; so she averred to herself. She had intended only to defend and
save her own property. Even the lie that she had told, and the telling of
which was continued from day to day, had in a measure been forced upon her
by circumstances. She thought that Mrs. Carbuncle would sympathise with
her in that feeling which had prevented her from speaking the truth when
first the fact of the robbery was made known to herself in her own
bedroom. Mrs. Carbuncle was a lady who told many lies, as Lizzie well
knew, and surely could not be horrified at a lie told in such
circumstances. But it was not in Lizzie's nature to trust a woman. Mrs.
Carbuncle would tell Lord George, and that would destroy everything. When
she thought of confiding everything to her cousin, it was always in his
absence. The idea became dreadful to her as soon as he was present. She
could not dare to own to him that she had sworn falsely to the magistrate
at Carlisle. And so the burden had to be borne, increasing every hour in
weight, and the poor creature's back was not broad enough to bear it. She
thought of the necklace every waking minute, and dreamed of it when she
slept. She could not keep herself from unlocking her desk and looking at
it twenty times a day, although she knew the peril of such nervous
solicitude. If she could only rid herself of it altogether, she was sure
now that she would do so. She would throw it into the ocean fathoms deep,
if only she could find herself alone upon the ocean. But she felt that,
let her go where she might, she would be watched. She might declare to-
morrow her intention of going to Ireland, or, for that matter, to America.
But, were she to do so, some horrid policeman would be on her track. The
iron box had been a terrible nuisance to her; but the iron box had been as
nothing compared to the necklace locked up in her desk. From day to day
she meditated a plan of taking the thing out into the streets and dropping
it in the dark; but she was sure that were she to do so some one would
have watched her while she dropped it. She was unwilling to trust her old
friend Mr. Benjamin; but in these days her favourite scheme was to offer
the diamonds for sale to him at some very low price. If he would help her,
they might surely be got out of their present hiding-place into his hands.
Any man would be powerful to help if there were any man whom she could
trust. In furtherance of this scheme she went so far as to break a brooch
--a favourite brooch of her own--in order that she might have an excuse
for calling at the jewellers'. But even this she postponed from day to
day. Circumstances, as they had occurred, had taught her to believe that
the police could not insist on breaking open her desk unless some evidence
could be brought against her. There was no evidence, and her desk was so
far safe. But the same circumstances had made her understand that she was
already suspected of some intrigue with reference to the diamonds--though
of what she was suspected she did not clearly perceive. As far as she
could divine the thoughts of her enemies, they did not seem to suppose
that the diamonds were in her possession. It seemed to be believed by
those enemies that they had passed into the hands of Lord George. As long
as her enemies were on a scent so false, might it not be best that she
should remain quiet?

But all the ingenuity, the concentrated force, and trained experience of
the police of London would surely be too great and powerful for her in the
long run. She could not hope to keep her secret and the diamonds till they
should acknowledge themselves to be baffled. And then she was aware of a
morbid desire on her own part to tell the secret--of a desire that
amounted almost to a disease. It would soon burst her bosom open, unless
she could share her knowledge with some one. And yet, as she thought of it
all, she told herself that she had no friend so fast and true as to
justify such confidence. She was ill with anxiety, and--worse than that--
Mrs. Carbuncle knew that she was ill. It was acknowledged between them
that this affair of the necklace was so terrible as to make a woman ill.
Mrs. Carbuncle at present had been gracious enough to admit so much as
that. But might it not be probable that Mrs. Carbuncle would come to
suspect that she did not know the whole secret? Mrs. Carbuncle had
already, on more than one occasion, said a little word or two which had
been unpleasant. Such was Lizzie's condition when Mr. Bunfit came, with
his authoritative request to be allowed to inspect Lizzie's boxes--and
when Mrs. Carbuncle, having secured her own privacy, expressed her opinion
that Mr. Bunfit should be allowed to do as he desired.




CHAPTER XLIX

BUNFIT AND GAGER


As soon as the words were out of Mrs. Carbuncle's mouth--those ill-natured
words in which she expressed her assent to Mr. Bunfit's proposition that a
search should be made after the diamonds among all the possessions of Lady
Eustace which were now lodged in her own house--poor Lizzie's courage
deserted her entirely. She had been very courageous; for, though her
powers of endurance had sometimes nearly deserted her, though her heart
had often failed her, still she had gone on and had endured and been
silent. To endure and to be silent in her position did require great
courage. She was all alone in her misery, and could see no way out of it.
The diamonds were heavy as a load of lead within her bosom. And yet she
had persevered. Now, as she heard Mrs. Carbuncle's words, her courage
failed her. There came some obstruction in her throat, so that she could
not speak. She felt as though her heart were breaking. She put out both
her hands and could not draw them back again. She knew that she was
betraying herself by her weakness. She could just hear the man explaining
that the search was merely a thing of ceremony--just to satisfy everybody
that there was no mistake--and then she fainted. So far, Barrington Erle
was correct in the information given by him to Lady Glencora. She pressed
one hand against her heart, gasped for breath, and then fell back upon the
sofa. Perhaps she could have done nothing better. Had the fainting been
counterfeit, the measure would have shown ability. But the fainting was
altogether true. Mrs. Carbuncle first, and then Mr. Bunfit, hurried from
their seats to help her. To neither of them did it occur for a moment that
the fit was false.

"The whole thing has been too much for her," said Mrs. Carbuncle severely,
ringing the bell at the same time for further aid.

"No doubt--mum; no doubt. We has to see a deal of this sort of thing. Just
a little air, if you please, mum--and as much water as'd go to christen a
babby. That's always best, mum."

"If you'll have the kindness to stand on one side," said Mrs. Carbuncle,
as she stretched Lizzie on the sofa.

"Certainly, mum," said Bunfit, standing erect by the wall, but not showing
the slightest disposition to leave the room.

"You had better go," said Mrs. Carbuncle--loudly and very severely.

"I'll just stay and see her come to, mum. I won't do her a morsel of harm,
mum. Sometimes they faints at the very first sight of such as we; but we
has to bear it. A little more air, if you could, mum--and just dash the
water on in drops like. They feels a drop more than they would a bucket-
full--and then when they comes to they hasn't to change theirselves."

Bunfit's advice, founded on much experience, was good, and Lizzie
gradually came to herself and opened her eyes. She immediately clutched at
her breast, feeling for her key. She found it unmoved, but before her
finger had recognised the touch, her quick mind had told her how wrong the
movement had been. It had been lost upon Mrs. Carbuncle, but not on Mr.
Bunfit. He did not at once think that she had the diamonds in her desk;
but he felt almost sure that there was something in her possession--
probably some document--which, if found, would place him on the track of
the diamonds. But he could not compel a search. "Your ladyship'll soon be
better," said Bunfit graciously. Lizzie endeavoured to smile as she
expressed her assent to this proposition. "As I was saying to the elder
lady----"

"Saying to who, sir?" exclaimed Mrs. Carbuncle, rising up in wrath. "Elder
indeed!"

"As I was venturing to explain, these fits of fainting come often in our
way. Thieves, mum--that is, the regulars--don't mind us a bit, and the
women is more hardeneder than the men; but when we has to speak to a lady,
it is so often that she goes off like that! I've known'm do it just at
being looked at."

"Don't you think, sir, that you'd better leave us now?" said Mrs.
Carbuncle.

"Indeed you had," said Lizzie. "I'm fit for nothing just at present."

"We won't disturb your ladyship the least in life," said Mr. Bunfit, "if
you'll only just let us have your keys. Your servant can be with us, and
we won't move one tittle of anything." But Lizzie, though she was still
suffering that ineffable sickness which always accompanies and follows a
real fainting-fit, would not surrender her keys. Already had an excuse for
not doing so occurred to her. But for a while she seemed to hesitate. "I
don't demand it, Lady Eustace," said Mr. Bunfit, "but if you'll allow me
to say so, I do think it will look better for your ladyship."

"I can take no step without consulting my cousin, Mr. Greystock," said
Lizzie; and having thought of this she adhered to it. The detective
supplied her with many reasons for giving up her keys, alleging that it
would do no harm, and that her refusal would create infinite suspicions.
But Lizzie had formed her answer and stuck to it. She always consulted her
cousin, and always acted upon his advice. He had already cautioned her not
to take any steps without his sanction. She would do nothing till he
consented. If Mr. Bunfit would see Mr. Greystock, and if Mr. Greystock
would come to her and tell her to submit--she would submit. Ill as she
was, she could be obstinate, and Bunfit left the house without having been
able to finger that key which he felt sure that Lady Eustace carried
somewhere on her person.

As he walked back to his own quarters in Scotland Yard, Bunfit was by no
means dissatisfied with his morning's work. He had not expected to find
anything with Lady Eustace, and, when she fainted, had not hoped to be
allowed to search. But he was now sure that her ladyship was possessed, at
any rate, of some guilty knowledge. Bunfit was one of those who, almost
from the first, had believed that the box was empty when taken out of the
hotel. "Stones like them must turn up more or less," was Bunfit's great
argument. That the police should already have found the stones themselves
was not perhaps probable; but had any ordinary thieves had them in their
hands, they could not have been passed on without leaving a trace behind
them. It was his opinion that the box had been opened and the door cut by
the instrumentality and concurrence of Lord George de Bruce Carruthers,
with the assistance of some one well-skilled mechanical thief. Nothing
could be made out of the tall footman. Indeed, the tall footman had
already been set at liberty, although he was known to have evil
associates; and the tall footman was now loud in demanding compensation
for the injury done to him. Many believed that the tall footman had been
concerned in the matter, many, that is, among the experienced craftsmen of
the police force. Bunfit thought otherwise. Bunfit believed that the
diamonds were now either in the possession of Lord George or of Harter &
Benjamin, that they had been handed over to Lord George to save them from
Messrs. Camperdown and the lawsuit, and that Lord George and the lady were
lovers. The lady's conduct at their last interview, her fit of fainting,
and her clutching for the key, all confirmed Bunfit in his opinion. But
unfortunately for Bunfit he was almost alone in his opinion. There were
men in the force, high in their profession as detectives, who avowed that
certainly two very experienced and well-known thieves had been concerned
in the business. That a certain Mr. Smiler had been there, a gentleman for
whom the whole police of London entertained a feeling which approached to
veneration, and that most diminutive of full-grown thieves, Billy Cann,
most diminutive but at the same time most expert, was not doubted by some
minds which were apt to doubt till conviction had become certainty. The
traveller who had left the Scotch train at Dumfries had been a very small
man, and it was a known fact that Mr. Smiler had left London by train from
the Euston Square station, on the day before that on which Lizzie and her
party had reached Carlisle. If it were so, if Mr. Smiler and Billy Cann
had both been at work at the hotel, then--so argued they who opposed the
Bunfit theory--it was hardly conceivable that the robbery should have been
arranged by Lord George. According to the Bunfit theory the only thing
needed by the conspirators had been that the diamonds should be handed
over by Lady Eustace to Lord George in such a way as to escape suspicion
that such transfer had been made. This might have been done with very
little trouble, by simply leaving the box empty, with the key in it. The
door of the bedroom had been opened by skilful professional men, and the
box had been forced by the use of tools which none but professional
gentlemen would possess. Was it probable that Lord George would have
committed himself with such men, and incurred the very heavy expense of
paying for their services, when he was, according to the Bunfit theory,
able to get at the diamonds without any such trouble, danger, and
expenditure? There was a young detective in the force, very clever--almost
too clever, and certainly a little too fast--Gager by name, who declared
that the Bunfit theory "warn't on the cards." According to Gager's
information, Smiler was at this moment a brokenhearted man, ranging
between mad indignation and suicidal despondency, because he had been
treated with treachery in some direction. Mr. Gager was as fully convinced
as Bunfit that the diamonds had not been in the box. There was bitter,
raging, heart-breaking disappointment about the diamonds in more quarters
than one. That there had been a double robbery Gager was quite sure; or
rather a robbery in which two sets of thieves had been concerned, and in
which one set had been duped by the other set. In this affair Mr. Smiler
and poor little Billy Cann had been the dupes. So far Gager's mind had
arrived at certainty. But then how had they been duped, and who had duped
them? And who had employed them? Such a robbery would hardly have been
arranged and executed except on commission. Even Mr. Smiler would not have
burdened himself with such diamonds without knowing what to do with them,
and what he should get for them. That they were intended ultimately for
the hands of Messrs. Harter & Benjamin, Gager almost believed. And Gager
was inclined to think that Messrs. Harter & Benjamin--or rather Mr.
Benjamin, for Mr. Harter himself was almost too old for work requiring so
very great mental activity--that Mr. Benjamin, fearing the honesty of his
executive officer Mr. Smiler, had been splendidly treacherous to his
subordinate. Gager had not quite completed his theory; but he was very
firm on one great point, that the thieves at Carlisle had been genuine
thieves, thinking that they were stealing the diamonds, and finding their
mistake out when the box had been opened by them under the bridge. "Who
have 'em, then?" asked Bunfit of his younger brother, in a disparaging
whisper.

"Well; yes; who 'ave 'em? It's easy to say, who 'ave 'em? Suppose 'e 'ave
'em." The "he" alluded to by Gager was Lord George de Bruce Carruthers.
"But laws, Bunfit, they're gone--weeks ago. You know that, Bunfit." This
had occurred before the intended search among poor Lizzie's boxes, but
Bunfit's theory had not been shaken. Bunfit could see all round his own
theory. It was a whole, and the motives as well as the operations of the
persons concerned were explained by it. But the Gager theory only went to
show what had not been done, and offered no explanation of the
accomplished scheme. Then Bunfit went a little further in his theory, not
disdaining to accept something from Gager. Perhaps Lord George had engaged
these men, and had afterwards found it practicable to get the diamonds
without their assistance. On one great point all concerned in the inquiry
were in unison--that the diamonds had not been in the box when it was
carried out of the bedroom at Carlisle. The great point of difference
consisted in this, that whereas Gager was sure that the robbery when
committed had been genuine, Bunfit was of opinion that the box had been
first opened, and then taken out of the hotel in order that the police
might be put on a wrong track.

The matter was becoming very important. Two or three of the leading
newspapers had first hinted at and then openly condemned the incompetence
and slowness of the police. Such censure, as we all know, is very common,
and in nine cases out of ten it is unjust. They who write it probably know
but little of the circumstances; and, in speaking of a failure here and a
failure there, make no reference to the numerous successes, which are so
customary as to partake of the nature of routine. It is the same in regard
to all public matters; army matters, navy matters, poor-law matters, and
post-office matters. Day after day, and almost every day, one meets
censure which is felt to be unjust; but the general result of all this
injustice is increased efficiency. The coach does go the faster because of
the whip in the coachman's hand, though the horse driven may never have
deserved the thong. In this matter of the Eustace diamonds the police had
been very active; but they had been unsuccessful and had consequently been
abused. The robbery was now more than three weeks old. Property to the
amount of ten thousand pounds had been abstracted, and as yet the police
had not even formed an assured opinion on the subject! Had the same thing
occurred in New York or Paris every diamond would by this time have been
traced. Such were the assertions made, and the police were instigated to
new exertions. Bunfit would have jeopardised his right hand, and Gager his
life, to get at the secret. Even Major Mackintosh was anxious.

The facts of the claim made by Mr. Camperdown, and of the bill which had
been filed in Chancery for the recovery of the diamonds, were of course
widely known, and added much to the general interest and complexity. It
was averred that Mr. Camperdown's determination to get the diamonds had
been very energetic, and Lady Eustace's determination to keep them equally
so. Wonderful stories were told of Lizzie's courage, energy, and
resolution. There was hardly a lawyer of repute but took up the question,
and had an opinion as to Lizzie's right to the necklace. The Attorney and
Solicitor-General were dead against her, asserting that the diamonds
certainly did not pass to her under the will, and could not have become
hers by gift. But they were members of a Liberal government, and of course
Antilizzieite. Gentlemen who were equal to them in learning, who had held
offices equally high, were distinctly of a different opinion. Lady Eustace
might probably claim the jewels as paraphernalia properly appertaining to
her rank; in which claim the bestowal of them by her husband would no
doubt assist her. And to these gentlemen--who were Lizzieites and of
course Conservatives in politics--it was by no means clear that the
diamonds did not pass to her by will. If it could be shown that the
diamonds had been lately kept in Scotland, the ex-Attorney-General thought
that they would so pass. All which questions, now that the jewels had been
lost, were discussed openly, and added greatly to the anxiety of the
police. Both Lizzieites and Antilizzieites were disposed to think that
Lizzie was very clever.

Frank Greystock in these days took up his cousin's part altogether in good
faith. He entertained not the slightest suspicion that she was deceiving
him in regard to the diamonds. That the robbery had been a bona fide
robbery, and that Lizzie had lost her treasure, was to him beyond doubt.
He had gradually convinced himself that Mr. Camperdown was wrong in his
claim, and was strongly of opinion that Lord Fawn had disgraced himself by
his conduct to the lady. When he now heard, as he did hear, that some
undefined suspicion was attached to his cousin, and when he heard also--as
unfortunately he did hear--that Lord Fawn had encouraged that suspicion,
he was very irate, and said grievous things of Lord Fawn. It seemed to him
to be the extremity of cruelty that suspicion should be attached to his
cousin because she had been robbed of her jewels. He was among those who
were most severe in their denunciation of the police--and was the more so,
because he had heard it asserted that the necklace had not in truth been
stolen. He busied himself very much in the matter, and even interrogated
John Eustace as to his intentions. "My dear fellow," said Eustace, "if you
hated those diamonds as much as I do, you would never mention them again."
Greystock declared that this expression of aversion to the subject might
be all very well for Mr. Eustace, but that he found himself bound to
defend his cousin. "You cannot defend her against me," said Eustace, "for
I do not attack her. I have never said a word against her. I went down to
Portray when she asked me. As far as I am concerned she is perfectly
welcome to wear the necklace, if she can get it back again. I will not
make or meddle in the matter one way or the other." Frank, after that,
went to Mr. Camperdown, but he could get no satisfaction from the
attorney. Mr. Camperdown would say only that he had a duty to do, and that
he must do it. On the matter of the robbery he refused to give an opinion.
That was in the hands of the police. Should the diamonds be recovered, he
would, of course, claim them on behalf of the estate. In his opinion,
whether the diamonds were recovered or not, Lady Eustace was responsible
to the estate for their value. In opposition, first to the entreaties, and
then to the demands, of her late husband's family, she had insisted on
absurdly carrying about with her an enormous amount of property which did
not belong to her. Mr. Camperdown opined that she must pay for the lost
diamonds out of her jointure. Frank, in a huff, declared that, as far as
he could see, the diamonds belonged to his cousin; in answer to which Mr.
Camperdown suggested that the question was one for the decision of the
Vice-Chancellor. Frank Greystock found that he could do nothing with Mr.
Camperdown, and felt that he could wreak his vengeance only on Lord Fawn.

Bunfit, when he returned from Mrs. Carbuncle's house to Scotland Yard, had
an interview with Major Mackintosh. "Well, Bunfit, have you seen the
lady?"

"Yes, I did see her, sir."

"And what came of it?"

"She fainted away, sir--just as they always do."

"There was no search, I suppose?"

"No, sir; no search. She wouldn't have it, unless her cousin. Mr.
Greystock, permitted."

"I didn't think she would."

"Nor yet didn't I, sir. But I'll tell you what it is, major. She knows all
about it."

"You think she does, Bunfit?"

"She does, sir; and she's got something locked up somewhere in that house
as'd elucidate the whole of this aggravating mystery, if only we could get
at it, Major----"

"Well, Bunfit."

"I ain't noways sure as she ain't got them very diamonds themselves locked
up, or, perhaps, tied round her person."

"Neither am I sure that she has not," said the major.

"The robbery at Carlisle was no robbery," continued Bunfit. "It was a got-
up plant, and about the best as I ever knowed. It's my mind that it was a
got-up plant between her ladyship and his lordship; and either the one or
the other is just keeping the diamonds till it's safe to take 'em into the
market."




CHAPTER L

IN HERTFORD STREET


During all this time Lucinda Roanoke was engaged to marry Sir Griffin
Tewett, and the lover was an occasional visitor in Hertford Street. Mrs.
Carbuncle was as anxious as ever that the marriage should be celebrated on
the appointed day, and though there had been repeated quarrels, nothing
had as yet taken place to make her despond. Sir Griffin would make some
offensive speech. Lucinda would tell him that she had no desire ever to
see him again, and then the baronet, usually under the instigation of Lord
George, would make some awkward apology. Mrs. Carbuncle, whose life at
this period was not a pleasant one, would behave on such occasions with
great patience, and sometimes with great courage. Lizzie, who in her
present emergency could not bear the idea of losing the assistance of any
friend, was soft and graceful, and even gracious, to the bear. The bear
himself certainly seemed to desire the marriage, though he would so often
give offence which made any prospect of a marriage almost impossible. But
with Sir Griffin, when the prize seemed to be lost, it again became
valuable. He would talk about his passionate love to Mrs. Carbuncle and to
Lizzie, and then, when things had been made straight for him, he would
insult them, and neglect Lucinda. To Lucinda herself, however, he would
rarely dare to say such words as he used daily to the other two ladies in
the house. What could have been the man's own idea of his future married
life, how can any reader be made to understand, or any writer adequately
describe? He must have known that the woman despised him, and hated him.
In the very bottom of his heart he feared her. He had no idea of other
pleasures from her society than what might arise to him from the pride of
having married a beautiful woman. Had she shown the slightest fondness for
him, the slightest fear that she might lose him, the slightest feeling
that she had won a valuable prize in getting him, he would have scorned
her, and jilted her without the slightest remorse. But the scorn came from
her, and it beat him down. "Yes, you hate me, and would fain be rid of me;
but you have said that you will be my wife, and you cannot now escape me."
Sir Griffin did not exactly speak such words as these, but he acted them.
Lucinda would bear his presence, sitting apart from him, silent,
imperious, but very beautiful. People said that she became more handsome
from day to day, and she did so, in spite of her agony. Hers was a face
which could stand such condition of the heart without fading or sinking
under it. She did not weep, or lose her colour, or become thin. The pretty
softness of a girl, delicate feminine weakness, or laughing eyes and
pouting lips, no one expected from her. Sir Griffin, in the early days of
their acquaintance, had found her to be a woman with a character for
beauty, and she was now more beautiful than ever. He probably thought that
he loved her; but, at any rate, he was determined that he would marry her.

He had expressed himself more than once as very angry about this affair of
the jewels. He had told Mrs. Carbuncle that her inmate, Lady Eustace, was
suspected by the police, and that it might be well that Lady Eustace
should be--be made to go, in fact. But it did not suit Mrs. Carbuncle that
Lady Eustace should be made to go; nor did it suit Lord George de Bruce
Carruthers. Lord George, at Mrs. Carbuncle's instance, had snubbed Sir
Griffin more than once, and then it came to pass that he was snubbed yet
again more violently than before. He was at the house in Hertford Street
on the day of Mr. Bunfit's visit, some hours after Mr. Bunfit was gone,
when Lizzie was still lying on her bed up-stairs, nearly beaten by the
great danger which had oppressed her. He was told of Mr. Bunfit's visit,
and then again said that he thought that the continued residence of Lady
Eustace beneath that roof was a misfortune. "Would you wish us to turn her
out because her necklace has been stolen?" asked Mrs. Carbuncle.

"People say very queer things," said Sir Griffin.

"So they do, Sir Griffin," continued Mrs. Carbuncle. "They say such queer
things that I can hardly understand that they should be allowed to say
them. I am told that the police absolutely suggest that Lord George stole
the diamonds."

"That's nonsense."

"No doubt, Sir Griffin. And so is the other nonsense. Do you mean to tell
us that you believe that Lady Eustace stole her own diamonds?"

"I don't see the use of having her here. Situated as I am, I have a right
to object to it."

"Situated as you are, Sir Griffin!" said Lucinda.

"Well, yes, of course; if we are to be married, I cannot but think a good
deal of the persons you stay with."

"You were very glad to stay yourself with Lady Eustace at Portray," said
Lucinda.

"I went there to follow you," said Sir Griffin gallantly.

"I wish with all my heart you had stayed away," said Lucinda. At that
moment Lord George was shown into the room, and Miss Roanoke continued
speaking, determined that Lord George should know how the bear was
conducting himself. "Sir Griffin is saying that my aunt ought to turn Lady
Eustace out of the house."

"Not quite that," said Sir Griffin with an attempt at laughter.

"Quite that," said Lucinda. "I don't suppose that he suspects poor Lady
Eustace, but he thinks that my aunt's friend should be like Caesar's wife,
above the suspicion of others."

"If you would mind your own business, Tewett," said Lord George, "it would
be a deal better for us all. I wonder Mrs. Carbuncle does not turn you out
of the room for making such a proposition here. If it were my room, I
would."

"I suppose I can say what I please to Mrs. Carbuncle? Miss Roanoke is not
going to be your wife."

"It is my belief that Miss Roanoke will be nobody's wife, at any rate, for
the present," said that young lady; upon which Sir Griffin left the room,
muttering some words which might have been, perhaps, intended for an
adieu. Immediately after this Lizzie came in, moving slowly, but without a
sound, like a ghost, with pale cheeks and dishevelled hair, and that
weary, worn look of illness which was become customary with her. She
greeted Lord George with a faint attempt at a smile, and seated herself in
a corner of a sofa. She asked whether he had been told the story of the
proposed search, and then bade her friend Mrs. Carbuncle describe the
scene.

"If it goes on like this it will kill me," said Lizzie.

"They are treating me in precisely the same way," said Lord George.

"But think of your strength and of my weakness, Lord George."

"By heavens, I don't know," said Lord George. "In this matter your
weakness is stronger than any strength of mine. I never was so cut up in
my life. It was a good joke when we talked of the suspicions of that
fellow at Carlisle as we came up by the railway, but it is no joke now.
I've had men with me, almost asking to search among my things."

"They have quite asked me," said Lizzie piteously.

"You; yes. But there's some reason in that. These infernal diamonds did
belong to you, or, at any rate you had them. You are the last person known
to have seen them. Even if you had them still, you'd only have what you
call your own." Lizzie looked at him with all her eyes and listened to him
with all her ears. "But what the mischief can I have had to do with them?"

"It's very hard upon you," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Unless I stole them," continued Lord George.

"Which is so absurd, you know," said Lizzie.

"That a pig-headed provincial fool should have taken me for a midnight
thief, did not disturb me much. I don't think I am very easily annoyed by
what other people think of me. But these fellows, I suppose, were sent
here by the head of the metropolitan police; and everybody knows that they
have been sent. Because I was civil enough to you women to look after you
coming up to town, and because one of you was careless enough to lose her
jewels, I--I am to be talked about all over London as the man who took
them!" This was not spoken with much courtesy to the ladies present. Lord
George had dropped that customary chivalry of manner which, in ordinary
life, makes it to be quite out of the question that a man shall be uncivil
to a woman. He had escaped from conventional usage into rough, truthful
speech, under stress from the extremity of the hardship to which he had
been subjected. And the women understood it and appreciated it, and liked
it rather than otherwise. To Lizzie it seemed fitting that a Corsair so
circumstanced should be as uncivil as he pleased; and Mrs. Carbuncle had
long been accustomed to her friend's moods.

"They can't really think it," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Somebody thinks it. I am told that your particular friend, Lord Fawn"--
this he said specially addressing Lizzie--"has expressed a strong opinion
that I carry about the necklace always in my pocket. I trust to have the
opportunity of wringing his neck some day."

"I do so wish you would," said Lizzie.

"I shall not lose a chance if I can get it. Before all this occurred, I
should have said of myself that nothing of the kind could put me out. I
don't think there is a man in the world cares less what people say of him
than I do. I am as indifferent to ordinary tittle-tattle as a rhinoceros.
But, by George, when it comes to stealing ten thousand pounds' worth of
diamonds, and the delicate attentions of all the metropolitan police, one
begins to feel that one is vulnerable. When I get up in the morning, I
half feel that I shall be locked up before night, and I can see in the
eyes of every man I meet that he takes me for the prince of burglars!"

"And it is all my fault," said Lizzie.

"I wish the diamonds had been thrown into the sea," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"What do you think about them yourself?" asked Lucinda.

"I don't know what to think. I'm at a dead loss. You know that man Mr.
Benjamin, Lady Eustace?" Lizzie, with a little start, answered that she
did, that she had had dealings with him before her marriage, and had once
owed him two or three hundred pounds. As the man's name had been
mentioned, she thought it better to own as much. "So he tells me. Now, in
all London, I don't suppose there is a greater rascal than Benjamin."

"I didn't know that," said Lizzie.

"But I did; and with that rascal I have had money dealings for the last
six or seven years. He has cashed bills for me, and has my name to bills
now--and Sir Griffin's too. I'm half inclined to think that he has got the
diamonds."

"Do you indeed?" said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Mr. Benjamin!" said Lizzie.

"And he returns the compliment."

"How does he return it?" asked Mrs. Carbuncle.

"He either thinks that I've got 'em or he wants to make me believe that he
thinks so. He hasn't dared to say it--but that's his intention. Such an
opinion from such a man on such a subject would be quite a compliment. And
I feel it. But yet it troubles me. You know that greasy, Israelitish smile
of his, Lady Eustace." Lizzie nodded her head and tried to smile. "When I
asked him yesterday about the diamonds, he leered at me and rubbed his
hands. 'It's a pretty little game--ain't it, Lord George?' he said. I told
him that I thought it a very bad game, and that I hoped the police would
have the thief and the necklace soon. 'It's been managed a deal too well
for that, Lord George--don't you think so?'" Lord George mimicked the Jew
as he repeated the words, and the ladies, of course, laughed. But poor
Lizzie's attempt at laughter was very sorry. "I told him to his face that
I thought he had them among his treasures. 'No, no, no, Lord George,' he
said, and seemed quite to enjoy the joke. If he's got them himself, he
can't think that I have them; but if he has not, I don't doubt but he
believes that I have. And I'll tell you another person who suspects me."

"What fools they are!" said Lizzie.

"I don't know how that may be. Sir Griffin, Lucinda, isn't at all sure but
what I have them in my pocket."

"I can believe anything of him," said Lucinda.

"And it seems he can believe anything of me. I shall begin to think soon
that I did take them, myself--or, at any rate, that I ought to have done
so. I wonder what you three women think of it. If you do think I've got
'em, don't scruple to say so. I'm quite used to it, and it won't hurt me
any further." The ladies again laughed. "You must have your suspicions,"
continued he.

"I suppose some of the London thieves did get them," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"The police say the box was empty," said Lord George.

"How can the police know?" asked Lucinda. "They weren't there to see. Of
course the thieves would say that they didn't take them."

"What do you think, Lady Eustace?"

"I don't know what to think. Perhaps Mr. Camperdown did it."

"Or the Lord Chancellor," said Lord George. "One is just as likely as the
other. I wish I could get at what you really think. The whole thing would
be so complete if all you three suspected me. I can't get out of it all by
going to Paris or Kamtchatka, as I should have half a dozen detectives on
my heels wherever I went. I must brazen it out here; and the worst of it
is, that I feel that a look of guilt is creeping over me. I have a sort of
conviction growing upon me that I shall be taken up and tried, and that a
jury will find me guilty. I dream about it; and if--as is probable--it
drives me mad, I'm sure that I shall accuse myself in my madness. There's
a fascination about it that I can't explain or escape. I go on thinking
how I would have done it if I did do it. I spend hours in calculating how
much I would have realised, and where I would have found my market. I
couldn't keep myself from asking Benjamin the other day how much they
would be worth to him."

"What did he say?" asked Lizzie, who sat gazing upon the Corsair, and who
was now herself fascinated. Lord George was walking about the room, then
sitting for a moment in one chair and again in another, and after a while
leaning on the mantelpiece. In his speaking he addressed himself almost
exclusively to Lizzie, who could not keep her eyes from his.

"He grinned greasily," said the Corsair, "and told me they had already
been offered to him once before by you."

"That's false!" said Lizzie.

"Very likely. And then he said that no doubt they'd fall into his hands
some day. 'Wouldn't it be a game, Lord George,' he said, 'if, after all,
they should be no more than paste?' That made me think he had got them,
and that he'd get paste diamonds put into the same setting--and then give
them up with some story of his own making. 'You'd know whether they were
paste or not, wouldn't you, Lord George?' he asked." The Corsair, as he
repeated Mr. Benjamin's words, imitated the Jew's manner so well that he
made Lizzie shudder. "While I was there, a detective named Gager came in."

"The same man who came here, perhaps," suggested Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I think not. He seemed to be quite intimate with Mr. Benjamin, and went
on at once about the diamonds. Benjamin said that they'd made their way
over to Paris, and that he'd heard of them. I found myself getting quite
intimate with Mr. Gager, who seemed hardly to scruple at showing that he
thought that Benjamin and I were confederates. Mr. Camperdown has offered
four hundred pounds reward for the jewels, to be paid on their surrender
to the hands of Mr. Garnett, the jeweller. Gager declared that, if any
ordinary thief had them, they would be given up at once for that sum."

"That's true, I suppose," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"How would the ordinary thief get his money without being detected? Who
would dare to walk into Garnett's shop with the diamonds in his hands and
ask for the four hundred pounds? Besides, they have been sold to some one,
and, as I believe, to my dear friend, Mr. Benjamin. 'I suppose you ain't
a-going anywhere just at present, Lord George?' said that fellow Gager.
'What the devil's that to you?' I asked him. He just laughed and shook his
head. I don't doubt but that there's a policeman about waiting till I
leave this house; or looking at me now with a magnifying glass from the
windows at the other side. They've photographed me while I'm going about,
and published a list of every hair on my face in the 'Hue and Cry.' I
dined at the club yesterday, and found a strange waiter. I feel certain
that he was a policeman done up in livery all for my sake. I turned sharp
round in the street yesterday, and found a man at a corner. I am sure that
man was watching me, and was looking at my pockets to see whether the
jewel case was there. As for myself, I can think of nothing else. I wish I
had got them. I should have something then to pay me for all this
nuisance."

"I do wish you had," said Lizzie.

"What I should do with them I cannot even imagine. I am always thinking of
that, too, making plans for getting rid of them, supposing I had stolen
them. My belief is, that I should be so sick of them that I should chuck
them over the bridge into the river, only that I should fear that some
policeman's eye would be on me as I did it. My present position is not
comfortable, but if I had got them I think that the weight of them would
crush me altogether. Having a handle to my name, and being a lord, or, at
least, called a lord, makes it all the worse. People are so pleased to
think that a lord should have stolen a necklace!"

Lizzie listened to it all with a strange fascination. If this strong man
were so much upset by the bare suspicion, what must be her condition? The
jewels were in her desk up-stairs, and the police had been with her also,
were even now probably looking after her and watching her. How much more
difficult must it be for her to deal with the diamonds than it would have
been for this man. Presently Mrs. Carbuncle left the room, and Lucinda
followed her. Lizzie saw them go, and did not dare to go with them. She
felt as though her limbs would not have carried her to the door. She was
now alone with her Corsair; and she looked up timidly into his deep-set
eyes, as he came and stood over her. "Tell me all that you know about it,"
he said, in that deep, low voice which, from her first acquaintance with
him, had filled her with interest, and almost with awe.




CHAPTER LI

CONFIDENCE


Lizzie Eustace was speechless as she continued to look up into the
Corsair's face. She ought to have answered him briskly, either with
indignation or with a touch of humour. But she could not answer him at
all. She was desired to tell him all that she knew about the robbery, and
she was unable to declare that she knew nothing. How much did he suspect?
What did he believe? Had she been watched by Mrs. Carbuncle, and had
something of the truth been told to him? And then would it not be better
for her that he should know it all? Unsupported and alone she could not
bear the trouble which was on her. If she were driven to tell her secret
to any one, had she not better tell it to him? She knew that if she did
so, she would be a creature in his hands to be dealt with as he pleased;
but would there not be a certain charm in being so mastered? He was but a
pinchbeck lord. She had wit enough to know that; but then she had wit
enough also to feel that she herself was but a pinchbeck lady. He would be
fit for her, and she for him, if only he would take her. Since her
daydreams first began, she had been longing for a Corsair; and here he
was, not kneeling at her feet, but standing over her, as became a Corsair.
At any rate he had mastered her now, and she could not speak to him.

He waited perhaps a minute, looking at her, before he renewed his
question; and the minute seemed to her to be an age. During every second
her power beneath his gaze sank lower and lower. There gradually came a
grim smile over his face, and she was sure that he could read her very
heart. Then he called her by her Christian name, as he had never called
her before. "Come, Lizzie," he said, "you might as well tell me all about
it. You know."

"Know what?" The words were audible to him, though they were uttered in
the lowest whisper.

"About this d--- necklace. What is it all? Where are they? And how did you
manage it?"

"I didn't manage anything!"

"But you know where they are?" He paused again, still gazing at her.
Gradually there came across his face, or she fancied that it was so, a
look of ferocity which thoroughly frightened her. If he should turn
against her, and be leagued with the police against her, what chance would
she have? "You know where they are," he said, repeating his words. Then at
last she nodded her head, assenting to his assertion. "And where are they?
Come, out with it! If you won't tell me, you must tell some one else.
There has been a deal too much of this already."

"You won't betray me?"

"Not if you deal openly with me."

"I will; indeed I will. And it was all an accident. When I took them out
of the box, I only did it for safety."

"You did take them out of the box then?" Again she nodded her head. "And
have got them now?" There was another nod. "And where are they? Come; with
such an enterprising spirit as yours, you ought to be able to speak. Has
Benjamin got them?"

"Oh, no."

"And he knows nothing about them?"

"Nothing."

"Then I have wronged in my thoughts that son of Abraham."

"Nobody knows anything," said Lizzie.

"Not even Jane or Lucinda?"

"Nothing at all."

"Then you have kept your secret marvellously. And where are they?"

"Up-stairs."

"In your bedroom?"

"In my desk in the little sitting-room."

"The Lord be good to us!" ejaculated Lord George. "All the police in
London, from the chief downwards, are agog about this necklace. Every
well-known thief in the town is envied by every other thief because he is
thought to have had a finger in the pie. I am suspected, and Mr. Benjamin
is suspected; Sir Griffin is suspected, and half the jewellers in London
and Paris are supposed to have the stones in their keeping. Every man and
woman is talking about it, and people are quarrelling about it till they
almost cut each other's throats; and all the while you have got them
locked up in your desk! How on earth did you get the box broken open and
then conveyed out of your room at Carlisle?"

Then Lizzie, in a frightened whisper, with her eyes often turned on the
floor, told the whole story. "If I'd had a minute to think of it," she
said, "I would have confessed the truth at Carlisle. Why should I want to
steal what was my own? But they came to me all so quickly, and I didn't
like to say that I had them under my pillow."

"I dare say not."

"And then I couldn't tell anybody afterwards. I always meant to tell you,
from the very first, because I knew you would be good to me. They are my
own. Surely I might do what I liked with my own?"

"Well, yes; in one way. But you see there was a lawsuit in Chancery going
on about them; and then you committed perjury at Carlisle. And altogether,
it's not quite straight sailing, you know."

"I suppose not."

"Hardly. Major Mackintosh, and the magistrates, and Messrs. Bunfit and
Gager won't settle down, peaceable and satisfied, when they hear the end
of the story. And I think Messrs. Camperdown will have a bill against you.
It's been uncommonly clever, but I don't see the use of it."

"I've been very foolish," said Lizzie; "but you won't desert me?"

"Upon my word I don't know what I'm to do."

"Will you have them as a present?"

"Certainly not."

"They're worth ever so much; ten thousand pounds! And they are my own, to
do just what I please with them."

"You are very good; but what should I do with them?"

"Sell them."

"Who'd buy them? And before a week was over I should be in prison, and in
a couple of months should be standing at the Old Bailey at my trial. I
couldn't just do that, my dear."

"What will you do for me? You are my friend--ain't you?" The diamond
necklace was not a desirable possession in the eyes of Lord George de
Bruce Carruthers; but Portray Castle, with its income, and the fact that
Lizzie Eustace was still a very young woman, was desirable. Her prettiness
too was not altogether thrown away on Lord George, though, as he was wont
to say to himself, he was too old now to sacrifice much for such a toy as
that. Something he must do, if only because of the knowledge which had
come to him. He could not go away and leave her, and neither say nor do
anything in the matter. And he could not betray her to the police.

"You will not desert me," she said, taking hold of his hand, and kissing
it as a suppliant.

He passed his arm round her waist, but more as though she were a child
than a woman, as he stood thinking. Of all the affairs in which he had
ever been engaged, it was the most difficult. She submitted to his
embrace, and leaned upon his shoulder, and looked up into his face. If he
would only tell her that he loved her, then he would be bound to her, then
must he share with her the burthen of the diamonds, then must he be true
to her. "George," she said, and burst into a low suppressed wailing, with
her face hidden upon his arm.

"That's all very well," said he, still holding her, for she was pleasant
to hold, "but what the d---- is a fellow to do? I don't see my way out of
it. I think you'd better go to Camperdown, and give them up to him, and
tell him the truth." Then she sobbed more violently than before, till her
quick ear caught the sound of a footstep on the stairs, and in a moment
she was out of his arms and seated on the sofa, with hardly a trace of
tears in her eyes. It was the footman, who desired to know whether Lady
Eustace would want the carriage that afternoon. Lady Eustace, with her
cheeriest voice, sent her love to Mrs. Carbuncle, and her assurance that
she would not want the carriage before the evening. "I don't know that you
can do anything else," continued Lord George, "except just give them up
and brazen it out. I don't suppose they'd prosecute you."

"Prosecute me!" ejaculated Lizzie.

"For perjury, I mean."

"And what could they do to me?"

"Oh, I don't know. Lock you up for five years, perhaps."

"Because I had my own necklace under the pillow in my own room?"

"Think of all the trouble you've given."

"I'll never give them up to Mr. Camperdown. They are mine; my very own. My
cousin, Mr. Greystock, who is much more of a lawyer than Mr. Camperdown,
says so. Oh, George, do think of something. Don't tell me that I must give
them up. Wouldn't Mr. Benjamin buy them?"

"Yes, for half nothing; and then go and tell the whole story and get money
from the other side. You can't trust Benjamin."

"But I can trust you." She clung to him and implored him, and did get from
him a renewed promise that he would not reveal her secret. She wanted him
to take the terrible packet from her there and then, and use his own
judgment in disposing of it. But this he positively refused to do. He
protested that they were safer with her than they could be with him. He
explained to her that if they were found in his hands, his offence in
having them in his possession would be much greater than hers. They were
her own, as she was ever so ready to assert; or if not her own, the
ownership was so doubtful that she could not be accused of having stolen
them. And then he needed to consider it all, to sleep upon it, before he
could make up his mind what he would do.

But there was one other trouble on her mind as to which he was called upon
to give her counsel before he was allowed to leave her. She had told the
detective officer that she would submit her boxes and desks to be searched
if her cousin Frank should advise it. If the policeman were to return with
her cousin while the diamonds were still in her desk, what should she do?
He might come at any time; and then she would be bound to obey him.

"And he thinks that they were stolen at Carlisle?" asked Lord George.

"Of course he thinks so," said Lizzie, almost indignantly.

"They would never ask to search your person," suggested Lord George.
Lizzie could not say. She had simply declared that she would be guided by
her cousin.

"Have them about you when he comes. Don't take them out with you; but keep
them in your pocket while you are in the house during the day. They will
hardly bring a woman with them to search you."

"But there was a woman with the man when he came before."

"Then you must refuse in spite of your cousin. Show yourself angry with
him and with everybody. Swear that you did not intend to submit yourself
to such indignity as that. They can't do it without a magistrate's order,
unless you permit it. I don't suppose they will come at all; and if they
do they will only look at your clothes and your boxes. If they ask to do
more, be stout with them and refuse. Of course, they'll suspect you, but
they do that already. And your cousin will suspect you; but you must put
up with that. It will be very bad; but I see nothing better. But, of all
things, say nothing of me."

"Oh, no," said Lizzie, promising to be obedient to him. And then he took
his leave of her.

"You will be true to me, will you not?" she said, still clinging to his
arm. He promised her that he would. "Oh, George," she said, "I have no
friend now but you. You will care for me?" He took her in his arms and
kissed her, and promised her that he would care for her. How was he to
save himself from doing so? When he was gone, Lizzie sat down to think of
it all, and felt sure that at last she had found her Corsair.




CHAPTER LII

MRS. CARBUNCLE GOES TO THE THEATRE


Mrs. Carbuncle and Lizzie Eustace did not, in these days, shut themselves
up because there was trouble in the household. It would not have suited
the creed of Mrs. Carbuncle on social matters to be shut up from the
amusements of life. She had sacrificed too much in seeking them for that,
and was too conscious of the price she paid for them. It was still mid-
winter, but nevertheless there was generally some amusement arranged for
every evening. Mrs. Carbuncle was very fond of the play, and made herself
acquainted with every new piece as it came out. Every actor and actress of
note on the stage was known to her, and she dealt freely in criticisms on
their respective merits. The three ladies had a box at the Haymarket taken
for this very evening, at which a new piece, "The Noble Jilt," from the
hand of a very eminent author, was to be produced. Mrs. Carbuncle had
talked a great deal about "The Noble Jilt," and could boast that she had
discussed the merits of the two chief characters with the actor and
actress who were to undertake them. Miss Talbot had assured her that the
Margaret was altogether impracticable, and Mrs. Carbuncle was quite of the
same opinion. And as for the hero, Steinmark, it was a part that no man
could play so as to obtain the sympathy of an audience. There was a second
hero, a Flemish Count, tame as rain-water, Mrs. Carbuncle said. She was
very anxious for the success of the piece, which, as she said, had its
merits; but she was sure that it wouldn't do. She had talked about it a
great deal, and now, when the evening came, she was not going to be
deterred from seeing it by any trouble in reference to a diamond necklace.
Lizzie, when she was left by Lord George, had many doubts on the subject,
whether she would go or stay at home. If he would have come to her, or her
cousin Frank, or if, had it been possible, Lord Fawn would have come, she
would have given up the play very willingly. But to be alone, with her
necklace in the desk up-stairs, or in her pocket, was terrible to her. And
then, they could not search her or her boxes while she was at the theatre.
She must not take the necklace with her there. He had told her to leave it
in her desk when she went from home.

Lucinda, also, was quite determined that she would see the new piece. She
declared to her aunt, in Lizzie's presence, without a vestige of a smile,
that it might be well to see how a jilt could behave herself, so as to do
her work of jilting in any noble fashion.

"My dear," said her aunt, "you let things weigh upon your heart a great
deal too much."

"Not upon my heart, Aunt Jane," the young lady had answered. She also
intended to go, and when she had made up her mind to anything, nothing
would deter her. She had no desire to stay at home in order that she might
see Sir Griffin. "I dare say the play may be very bad," she said, "but it
can hardly be so bad as real life."

Lizzie, when Lord George had left her, crept up-stairs, and sat for a
while thinking of her condition, with the key of her desk in her hand.
Should there come a knock at the door, the case of diamonds would be in
her pocket in a moment. Her own room door was bolted on the inside, so
that she might have an instant for her preparation. She was quite resolved
that she would carry out Lord George's recommendation, and that no
policeman or woman should examine her person, unless it were done by
violence. There she sat, almost expecting that at every moment her cousin
would be there with Bunfit and the woman. But nobody came, and at six she
went down to dinner. After much consideration she then left the diamonds
in the desk. Surely no one would come to search at such an hour as that.
No one had come when the carriage was announced, and the three ladies went
off together.

During the whole way Mrs. Carbuncle talked of the terrible situation in
which poor Lord George was placed by the robbery, and of all that Lizzie
owed him on account of his trouble.

"My dear," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "the least you can do for him is to give
him all that you've got to give."

"I don't know that he wants me to give him anything," said Lizzie.

"I think that's quite plain," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "and I'm sure I wish it
may be so. He and I have been dear friends--very dear friends, and there
is nothing I wish so much as to see him properly settled. Ill-natured
people like to say all manner of things because everybody does not choose
to live in their own heartless, conventional form. But I can assure you
there is nothing between me and Lord George which need prevent him from
giving his whole heart to you."

"I don't suppose there is," said Lizzie, who loved an opportunity of
giving Mrs. Carbuncle a little rap.

The play, as a play, was a failure; at least so said Mrs. Carbuncle. The
critics, on the next morning, were somewhat divided--not only in judgment,
but as to facts. To say how a play has been received is of more moment
than to speak of its own merits or of the merits of the actors. Three or
four of the papers declared that the audience was not only eulogistic, but
enthusiastic. One or two others averred that the piece fell very flatly.
As it was not acted above four or five dozen times consecutively, it must
be regarded as a failure. On their way home Mrs. Carbuncle declared that
Minnie Talbot had done her very best with such a part as Margaret, but
that the character afforded no scope for sympathy.

"A noble jilt, my dears," said Mrs. Carbuncle eloquently, "is a
contradiction in terms. There can be no such thing. A woman, when she has
once said the word, is bound to stick to it. The delicacy of the female
character should not admit of hesitation between two men. The idea is
quite revolting."

"But may not one have an idea of no man at all?" asked Lucinda. "Must that
be revolting also?"

"Of course a young woman may entertain such an idea; though for my part I
look upon it as unnatural. But when she has once given herself there can
be no taking back without the loss of that aroma which should be the apple
of a young woman's eye."

"If she finds that she has made a mistake--?" said Lucinda fiercely. "Why
shouldn't a young woman make a mistake as well as an old woman? Her aroma
won't prevent her from having been wrong and finding it out."

"My dear, such mistakes, as you call them, always arise from fantastic
notions. Look at this piece. Why does the lady jilt her lover? Not because
she doesn't like him. She's just as fond of him as ever."

"He's a stupid sort of a fellow, and I think she was quite right," said
Lizzie. "I'd never marry a man merely because I said I would. If I found I
didn't like him, I'd leave him at the altar. I'd leave him any time I
found I didn't like him. It's all very well to talk of aroma, but to live
with a man you don't like--is the devil."

"My dear, those whom God has joined together shouldn't be separated--for
any mere likings or dislikings." This Mrs. Carbuncle said in a high tone
of moral feeling, just as the carriage stopped at the door in Hertford
Street. They at once perceived that the hall-door was open, and Mrs.
Carbuncle, as she crossed the pavement, saw that there were two policemen
in the hall. The footman had been with them to the theatre, but the cook
and housemaid, and Mrs. Carbuncle's own maid, were with the policemen in
the passage. She gave a little scream, and then Lizzie, who had followed
her, seized her by the arm. She turned round and saw by the gas-light that
Lizzie's face was white as a sheet, and that all the lines of her
countenance were rigid and almost distorted. "Then she does know all about
it," said Mrs. Carbuncle to herself. Lizzie didn't speak, but still hung
on to Mrs. Carbuncle's arm, and Lucinda, having seen how it was, was also
supporting her. A policeman stepped forward and touched his hat. He was
not Bunfit--neither was he Gager. Indeed, though the ladies had not
perceived the difference, he was not at all like Bunfit or Gager. This man
was dressed in a policeman's uniform, whereas Bunfit and Gager always wore
plain clothes.

"My lady," said the policeman, addressing Mrs. Carbuncle, "there's been a
robbery here."

"A robbery!" ejaculated Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Yes, my lady. The servants all out, all to one; and she's off. They've
taken jewels, and, no doubt, money, if there was any. They don't mostly
come unless they know what they comes for."

With a horrid spasm across her heart, which seemed really to kill her, so
sharp was the pain, Lizzie recovered the use of her legs and followed Mrs.
Carbuncle into the dining-room. She had been hardly conscious of hearing;
but she had heard, and it had seemed to her that the robbery spoken of was
something distinct from her own affair. The policeman did not speak of
having found the diamonds. It was of something lost that they spoke. She
seated herself in a chair against the wall, but did not utter a word.
"We've been up-stairs, my lady, and they've been in most of the rooms.
There's a desk broke open." Lizzie gave an involuntary little scream.
"Yes, mum, a desk," continued the policeman turning to Lizzie," and a
bureau, and a dressing-case. What's gone your ladyship can tell when you
sees. And one of the young women is off. It's she as done it." Then the
cook explained. She and the housemaid, and Mrs. Carbuncle's lady's maid,
had just stepped out, only round the corner, to get a little air, leaving
Patience Crabstick in charge of the house; and when they came back, the
area gate was locked against them, the front door was locked, and finding
themselves unable to get in after many knockings, they had at last
obtained the assistance of a policeman. He had got into the place over the
area gate, had opened the front door from within, and then the robbery had
been discovered. It was afterwards found that the servants had all gone
out to what they called a tea-party, at a public-house in the
neighbourhood, and that by previous agreement Patience Crabstick had
remained in charge. When they came back Patience Crabstick was gone, and
the desk, and bureau, and dressing-case were found to have been opened.
"She had a reg'lar thief along with her, my lady," said the policeman,
still addressing himself to Mrs. Carbuncle, "'cause of the way the things
was opened."

"I always knew that young woman was downright bad," said Mrs. Carbuncle in
her first expression of wrath.

But Lizzie sat in her chair without saying a word, still pale with that
almost awful look of agony in her face. Within ten minutes of their
entering the house, Mrs. Carbuncle was making her way up-stairs, with the
two policemen following her. That her bureau and her dressing-case should
have been opened was dreadful to her, though the value that she could thus
lose was very small. She also possessed diamonds, but her diamonds were
paste; and whatever jewelry she had of any value, a few rings, and a
brooch, and such like, had been on her person in the theatre. What little
money she had by her was in the drawing-room, and the drawing-room, as it
seemed, had not been entered. In truth, all Mrs. Carbuncle's possessions
in the house were not sufficient to have tempted a well-bred, well-
instructed thief. But it behooved her to be indignant; and she could be
indignant with grace, as the thief was discovered to be, not her maid, but
Patience Crabstick. The policemen followed Mrs. Carbuncle, and the maids
followed the policemen; but Lizzie Eustace kept her seat in the chair by
the wall. "Do you think they have taken much of yours?" said Lucinda,
coming up to her and speaking very gently. Lizzie made a motion with her
two hands upon her heart, and struggled, and gasped, as though she wished
to speak but could not. "I suppose it is that girl who has done it all,"
said Lucinda. Lizzie nodded her head, and tried to smile. The attempt was
so ghastly that Lucinda, though not timid by nature, was frightened. She
sat down and took Lizzie's hand, and tried to comfort her. "It is very
hard upon you," she said, "to be twice robbed." Lizzie again nodded her
head. "I hope it is not much now. Shall we go up and see?" The poor
creature did get upon her legs, but she gasped so terribly that Lucinda
feared that she was dying. "Shall I send for some one?" she said. Lizzie
made an effort to speak, was shaken convulsively while the other supported
her, and then burst into a flood of tears.

When that had come she was relieved, and could again act her part. "Yes,"
she said, "we will go with them. It is so dreadful; is it not?"

"Very dreadful; but how much better that we weren't at home. Shall we go
now?" Then together they followed the others, and on the stairs Lizzie
explained that in her desk, of which she always carried the key round her
neck, there was what money she had by her--two ten-pound notes, and four
five-pound notes, and three sovereigns; in all, forty-three pounds. Her
other jewels, the jewels which she had possessed over and above the fatal
diamond necklace, were in her dressing-case. Patience, she did not doubt,
had known that the money was there, and certainly knew of her jewels. So
they went up-stairs. The desk was open and the money gone. Five or six
rings and a bracelet had been taken also from Lizzie's dressing-case,
which she had left open. Of Mrs. Carbuncle's property sufficient had been
stolen to make a long list in that lady's handwriting. Lucinda Roanoke's
room had not been entered, as far as they could judge. The girl had taken
the best of her own clothes, and a pair of strong boots belonging to the
cook. A superintendent of police was there before they went to bed, and a
list was made out. The superintendent was of opinion that the thing had
been done very cleverly, but also thought that the thieves had expected to
find more plunder.

"They don't care so much about banknotes, my lady, because they fetches
such a low price with them as they deal with. The three sovereigns is more
to them than all the forty pounds in notes." The superintendent had heard
of the diamond necklace, and expressed an opinion that poor Lady Eustace
was especially marked out for misfortune.

"It all comes of having such a girl as that about her," said Mrs.
Carbuncle. The superintendent, who intended to be consolatory to Lizzie,
expressed his opinion that it was very hard to know what a young woman
was.

"They looks as soft as butter, and they're as sly as foxes, and as quick,
as quick--as quick as greased lightning, my lady." Such a piece of
business as this which has just occurred will make people intimate at a
very short notice.

And so the diamond necklace, known to be worth ten thousand pounds, had at
last been stolen in earnest! Lizzie, when the policemen were gone, and the
noise was over, and the house was closed, slunk away to her bedroom,
refusing any aid in lieu of that of the wicked Patience. She herself had
examined the desk beneath the eyes of her two friends and of the
policemen, and had seen at once that the case was gone. The money was gone
too, as she was rejoiced to find. She perceived at once that had the money
been left, the very leaving of it would have gone to prove that other
prize had been there. But the money was gone--money of which she had given
a correct account--and she could now honestly allege that she had been
robbed. But she had at last really lost her great treasure; and if the
treasure should be found then would she infallibly be exposed. She had
talked twice of giving away her necklace, and had seriously thought of
getting rid of it by burying it deep in the sea. But now that it was in
very truth gone from her, the loss of it was horrible to her. Ten thousand
pounds, for which she had struggled so much and borne so many things,
which had come to be the prevailing fact of her life, gone from her
forever! Nevertheless it was not that sorrow, that regret, which had so
nearly overpowered her in the dining-parlour. At that moment she hardly
knew, had hardly thought, whether the diamonds had or had not been taken.
But the feeling came upon her at once that her own disgrace was every hour
being brought nearer to her. Her secret was no longer quite her own. One
man knew it, and he had talked to her of perjury and of five years'
imprisonment. Patience must have known it too; and now some one else also
knew it. The police, of course, would find it out, and then horrid words
would be used against her. She hardly knew what perjury was. It sounded
like forgery and burglary. To stand up before a judge and be tried, and
then to be locked up for five years in prison! What an end would this be
to all her glorious success! And what evil had she done to merit all this
terrible punishment? When they came to her in her bedroom at Carlisle she
had simply been too much frightened to tell them all that the necklace was
at that moment under her pillow.

She tried to think of it all, and to form some idea in her mind of what
might be the truth. Of course Patience Crabstick had known her secret, but
how long had the girl known it? And how had the girl discovered it? She
was almost sure, from certain circumstances, from words which the girl had
spoken, and from signs which she had observed, that Patience had not even
suspected that the necklace had been brought with them from Carlisle to
London. Of course the coming of Bunfit and the woman would have set the
girl's mind to work in that direction; but then Bunfit and the woman had
only been there on that morning. The Corsair knew the facts, and no one
but the Corsair. That the Corsair was a Corsair the suspicions of the
police had proved to her. She had offered the necklace to the Corsair; but
when so offered he had refused to take it. She could understand that he
should see the danger of accepting the diamonds from her hand, and yet
should be desirous of having them. And might not he have thought that he
could best relieve her from the burden of their custody in this manner?
She felt no anger against the Corsair as she weighed the probability of
his having taken them in this fashion. A Corsair must be a Corsair. Were
he to come to her and confess the deed, she would almost like him the
better for it, admiring his skill and enterprise. But how very clever he
must have been, and how brave! He had known, no doubt, that the three
ladies were all going to the theatre; but in how short a time had he got
rid of the other women and availed himself of the services of Patience
Crabstick!

But in what way would she conduct herself when the police should come to
her on the following morning, the police and all the other people who
would crowd to the house? How should she receive her cousin Frank? How
should she look when the coincidence of the double robbery should be
spoken of in her hearing? How should she bear herself when, as of course
would be the case, she should again be taken before the magistrates, and
made to swear as to the loss of her property? Must she commit more
perjury, with the certainty that various people must know that her oath
was false? All the world would suspect her. All the world would soon know
the truth. Might it not be possible that the diamonds were at this moment
in the hands of Messrs. Camperdown, and that they would be produced before
her eyes, as soon as her second false oath had been registered against
her? And yet how could she tell the truth? And what would the Corsair
think of her, the Corsair who would know everything? She made one
resolution during the night. She would not be taken into court. The
magistrates and the people might come to her, but she would not go before
them. When the morning came she said that she was ill, and refused to
leave her bed. Policemen, she knew, were in the house early. At about nine
Mrs. Carbuncle and Lucinda were up and in her room. The excitement of the
affair had taken them from their beds, but she would not stir. If it were
absolutely necessary, she said, the men must come into her room. She had
been so overset by what had occurred on the previous night that she could
not leave her room. She appealed to Lucinda as to the fact of her illness.
The trouble of these robberies was so great upon her that her heart was
almost broken. If her deposition must be taken, she would make it in bed.
In the course of the day the magistrate did come into her room and the
deposition was taken. Forty-three pounds had been taken from her desk, and
certain jewels, which she described, from her dressing-case. As far as she
was aware, no other property of hers was missing. This she said in answer
to a direct question from the magistrate, which, as she thought, was asked
with a stern voice and searching eye. And so, a second time, she had sworn
falsely. But this at least was gained, that Lord George de Bruce
Carruthers was not looking at her as she swore.

Lord George was in the house for a great part of the day, but he did not
ask to be admitted to Lizzie's room; nor did she ask to see him. Frank
Greystock was there late in the afternoon, and went up at once to see his
cousin. The moment that she saw him she stretched out her arms to him, and
burst into tears. "My poor girl," said he, "what is the meaning of it
all?"

"I don't know. I think they will kill me. They want to kill me. How can I
bear it all? The robbers were here last night, and magistrates and
policemen and people have been here all day." Then she fell into a fit of
sobbing and wailing, which was, in truth, hysterical. For, if the readers
think of it, the poor woman had a great deal to bear.

Frank, into whose mind no glimmer of suspicion against his cousin had yet
entered, and who firmly believed that she had been made a victim because
of the value of her diamonds, and who had a theory of his own about the
robbery at Carlisle, to the circumstances of which he was now at some
pains to make these latter circumstances adhere, was very tender with his
cousin, and remained in the house for more than an hour. "Oh, Frank, what
had I better do?" she asked him.

"I would leave London, if I were you."

"Yes; of course. I will. Oh yes, I will."

"If you don't fear the cold of Scotland----"

"I fear nothing, nothing but being where these policemen can come to me.
Oh!" and then she shuddered and was again hysterical. Nor was she acting
the condition. As she remembered the magistrates, and the detectives, and
the policemen in their uniforms, and reflected that she might probably see
much more of them before the game was played out, the thoughts that
crowded on her were almost more than she could bear.

"Your child is there, and it is your own house. Go there till all this
passes by." Whereupon she promised him that, as soon as she was well
enough, she would at once go to Scotland.

In the mean time, the Eustace diamonds were locked up in a small safe
fixed into the wall at the back of a small cellar beneath the
establishment of Messrs. Harter & Benjamin, in Minto Lane, in the City.
Messrs. Harter & Benjamin always kept a second place of business. Their
great shop was at the West End; but they had accommodation in the City.

The chronicler states this at once, as he scorns to keep from his reader
any secret that is known to himself.




CHAPTER LIII

LIZZIE'S SICK-ROOM


When the Hertford Street robbery was three days old, and was still the
talk of all the town, Lizzie Eustace was really ill. She had promised to
go down to Scotland in compliance with the advice given to her by her
cousin Frank, and at the moment of promising would have been willing
enough to be transported at once to Portray, had that been possible--so as
to be beyond the visits of policemen and the authority of lawyers and
magistrates; but as the hours passed over her head, and as her presence of
mind returned to her, she remembered that even at Portray she would not be
out of danger, and that she could do nothing in furtherance of her plans
if once immured there. Lord George was in London, Frank Greystock was in
London, and Lord Fawn was in London. It was more than ever necessary to
her that she should find a husband among them, a husband who would not be
less her husband when the truth of that business at Carlisle should be
known to all the world. She had, in fact, stolen nothing. She endeavoured
to comfort herself by repeating to herself over and over again that
assurance. She had stolen nothing; and she still thought that if she could
obtain the support of some strong arm on which to lean, she might escape
punishment for those false oaths which she had sworn. Her husband might
take her abroad, and the whole thing would die away. If she should succeed
with Lord George, of course he would take her abroad, and there would be
no need for any speedy return. They might roam among islands in pleasant
warm suns, and the dreams of her youth might be realised. Her income was
still her own. They could not touch that. So she thought, at least,
oppressed by some slight want of assurance in that respect. Were she to go
at once to Scotland, she must for the present give up that game
altogether. If Frank would pledge himself to become her husband in three
or four, or even in six months, she would go at once. She had more
confidence in Frank than even in Lord George. As for love, she would
sometimes tell herself that she was violently in love; but she hardly knew
with which. Lord George was certainly the best representative of that
perfect Corsair which her dreams had represented to her; but, in regard to
working life, she thought that she liked her cousin Frank better than she
had ever yet liked any other human being. But, in truth, she was now in
that condition, as she acknowledged to herself, that she was hardly
entitled to choose. Lord Fawn had promised to marry her, and to him as a
husband she conceived that she still had a right. Nothing had as yet been
proved against her which could justify him in repudiating his engagement.
She had, no doubt, asserted with all vehemence to her cousin that no
consideration would now induce her to give her hand to Lord Fawn; and when
making that assurance she had been, after her nature, sincere. But
circumstances were changed since that. She had not much hope that Lord
Fawn might be made to succumb, though evidence had reached her before the
last robbery which induced her to believe that he did not consider himself
to be quite secure. In these circumstances she was unwilling to leave
London though she had promised, and was hardly sorry to find an excuse in
her recognised illness.

And she was ill. Though her mind was again at work with schemes on which
she would not have busied herself without hope, yet she had not recovered
from the actual bodily prostration to which she had been compelled to give
way when first told of the robbery on her return from the theatre. There
had been moments then in which she thought that her heart would have
broken; moments in which, but that the power of speech was wanting, she
would have told everything to Lucinda Roanoke. When Mrs. Carbuncle was
marching up-stairs with the policemen at her heels she would willingly
have sold all her hopes, Portray Castle, her lovers, her necklace, her
income, her beauty, for any assurance of the humblest security. With that
quickness of intellect which was her peculiar gift, she had soon
understood, in the midst of her sufferings, that her necklace had been
taken by thieves whose robbery might assist her for a while in keeping her
secret, rather than lead to the immediate divulging of it. Neither
Camperdown nor Bunfit had been at work among the boxes. Her secret had
been discovered, no doubt, by Patience Crabstick, and the diamonds were
gone. But money also was taken, and the world need not know that the
diamonds had been there. But Lord George knew. And then there arose to her
that question: Had the diamonds been taken in consequence of that
revelation to Lord George? It was not surprising that in the midst of all
this Lizzie should be really ill.

She was most anxious to see Lord George; but, if what Mrs. Carbuncle said
to her was true, Lord George refused to see her. She did not believe Mrs.
Carbuncle, and was, therefore, quite in the dark about her Corsair. As she
could communicate with him only through Mrs. Carbuncle, it might well be
the case that he should have been told that he could not have access to
her. Of course there were difficulties. That her cousin Frank should see
her in her bedroom--her cousin Frank, with whom it was essentially
necessary that she should hold counsel as to her present great
difficulties--was a matter of course. There was no hesitation about that.
A fresh nightcap, and a clean pocket handkerchief with a bit of lace round
it, and perhaps some pretty covering to her shoulders if she were to be
required to sit up in bed, and the thing was arranged. He might have spent
the best part of his days in her bedroom if he could have spared the time.
But the Corsair was not a cousin, nor as yet an acknowledged lover. There
was difficulty even in framing a reason for her request, when she made it
to Mrs. Carbuncle; and the very reason which she gave was handed back to
her as the Corsair's reason for not coming to her. She desired to see him
because he had been so mixed up in the matter of these terrible robberies.
But Mrs. Carbuncle declared to her that Lord George would not come to her
because his name had been so frequently mentioned in connection with the
diamonds. "You see, my dear," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "there can be no real
reason for his seeing you up in your bedroom. If there had been anything
between you, as I once thought there would----." There was something in
the tone of Mrs. Carbuncle's voice which grated on Lizzie's ear, something
which seemed to imply that all that prospect was over.

"Of course," said Lizzie querulously, "I am very anxious to know what he
thinks. I care more about his opinion than anybody else's. As to his name
being mixed up in it, that is all a joke."

"It has been no joke to him, I can assure you," said Mrs. Carbuncle.
Lizzie could not press her request. Of course she knew more about it than
did Mrs. Carbuncle. The secret was in her own bosom, the secret as to the
midnight robbery at Carlisle, and that secret she had told to Lord George.
As to the robbery in London she knew nothing, except that it had been
perpetrated through the treachery of Patience Crabstick. Did Lord George
know more about it than she knew? and if so, was he now deterred by that
knowledge from visiting her? "You see, my dear," said Mrs. Carbuncle,
"that a gentleman visiting a lady with whom he has no connection, in her
bedroom, is in itself something very peculiar." Lizzie made a motion of
impatience under the bedclothes. Any such argument was trash to her, and
she knew that it was trash to Mrs. Carbuncle also. What was one man in her
bedroom more than another? She could see a dozen doctors if she pleased,
and if so, why not this man, whose real powers of doctoring her would be
so much more efficacious? "You would want to see him alone, too,"
continued Mrs. Carbuncle, "and, of course, the police would hear of it. I
am not at all surprised that he should stay away." Lizzie's condition did
not admit of much argument on her side, and she only showed her opposition
to Mrs. Carbuncle by being cross and querulous.

Frank Greystock came to her with great constancy almost every day, and
from him she did hear about the robbery all that he knew or heard. When
three days had passed, when six days, and even when ten days were gone,
nobody had been as yet arrested. The police, according to Frank, were much
on the alert, but were very secret. They either would not or could not
tell anything. To him the two robberies, that at Carlisle and the last
affair in Hertford Street, were of course distinct. There were those who
believed that the Hertford Street thieves and the Carlisle thieves were
not only the same, but that they had been in quest of the same plunder,
and had at last succeeded. But Frank was not one of these. He never for a
moment doubted that the diamonds had been taken at Carlisle, and explained
the second robbery by the supposition that Patience Crabstick had been
emboldened by success. The iron box had no doubt been taken by her
assistance, and her familiarity with the thieves, then established, had
led to the second robbery. Lizzie's loss in that second robbery had
amounted to some hundred pounds. This was Frank Greystock's theory, and of
course it was one very comfortable to Lizzie.

"They all seem to think that the diamonds are at Paris," he said to her
one day.

"If you only knew how little I care about them! It seems as though I had
almost forgotten them in these after troubles."

"Mr. Camperdown cares about them. I'm told he says that he can make you
pay for them out of your jointure."

"That would be very terrible, of course," said Lizzie, to whose mind there
was something consolatory in the idea that the whole affair of the robbery
might perhaps remain so mysterious as to remove her from the danger of
other punishment than this.

"I feel sure that he couldn't do it," said Frank, "and I don't think he'll
try it. John Eustace would not let him. It would be persecution."

"Mr. Camperdown has always chosen to persecute me," said Lizzie.

"I can understand that he shouldn't like the loss of the diamonds. I don't
think, Lizzie, you ever realized their true value."

"I suppose not. After all, a necklace is only a necklace. I cared nothing
for it--except that I could not bear the idea that that man should dictate
to me. I would have given it up at once, at the slightest word from you."
He did not care to remind her then, as she lay in bed, that he had been
very urgent in his advice to her to abandon the diamonds; and not the less
urgent because he had thought that the demand for them was unjust. "I told
you often;" she continued, "that I was tempted to throw them among the
waves. It was true, quite true. I offered to give them to you, and should
have been delighted to have been relieved from them."

"That was of course simply impossible."

"I know it was impossible on your part; but I would have been delighted.
Of what use were they to me? I wore them twice because that man"--meaning
Lord Fawn--"disputed my right to them. Before that I never even looked at
them. Do you think I had pleasure in wearing them, or pleasure in looking
at them? Never. They were only a trouble to me. It was a point of honour
with me to keep them, because I was attacked. But I am glad they are gone
--thoroughly glad." This was all very well, and was not without its effect
on Frank Greystock. It is hardly expected of a woman in such a condition,
with so many troubles on her mind, who had been so persecuted, that every
word uttered by her should be strictly true. Lizzie with her fresh
nightcap and her lace handkerchief, pale, and with her eyes just
glittering with tears, was very pretty.

"Didn't somebody once give some one a garment which scorched him up when
he wore it--some woman who sent it because she loved the man so much?"

"The shirt, you mean, which Deianira sent to Hercules. Yes, Hercules was a
good deal scorched."

"And that necklace, which my husband gave me because he loved me so well,
has scorched me horribly. It has nearly killed me. It has been like the
white elephant which the Eastern king gives to his subject when he means
to ruin him. Only poor Florian didn't mean to hurt me. He gave it all in
love. If these people bring a lawsuit against me, Frank, you must manage
it for me."

"There will be no lawsuit. Your brother-in-law will stop it.'r

"I wonder who will really get the diamonds after all, Frank? They were
very valuable. Only think that the ten thousand pounds should disappear in
such a way!" The subject was a very dangerous one, but there was a
fascination about it which made it impossible for her to refrain from it.

"A dishonest dealer in diamonds will probably realise the plunder--after
some years. There would be something very alluring in the theft of
articles of great value, were it not that, when got, they at once become
almost valueless by the difficulty of dealing with them. Supposing I had
the necklace!"

"I wish you had, Frank."

"I could do nothing with it. Ten sovereigns would go further with me--or
ten shillings. The burden of possessing it would in itself be almost more
than I could bear. The knowledge that I had the thing, and might be
discovered in having it, would drive me mad. By my own weakness I should
be compelled to tell my secret to some one. And then I should never sleep
for fear my partner in the matter should turn against me." How well she
understood it all! How probable it was that Lord George should turn
against her! How exact was Frank's description of that burden of a secret
so heavy that it cannot be borne alone! "A little reflection," continued
Frank, "soon convinces a man that rough downright stealing is an awkward,
foolish trade; and it therefore falls into the hands of those who want
education for the higher efforts of dishonesty. To get into a bank at
midnight and steal what little there may be in the till, or even an armful
of banknotes, with the probability of a policeman catching you as you
creep out of the chimney and through a hole, is clumsy work; but to walk
in amidst the smiles and bows of admiring managers and draw out money over
the counter by thousands and tens of thousands, which you have never put
in and which you can never repay, and which, when all is done, you have
only borrowed--that is a great feat."

"Do you really think so?"

"The courage, the ingenuity, and the self-confidence needed are certainly
admirable. And then there is a cringing and almost contemptible littleness
about honesty, which hardly allows it to assert itself. The really honest
man can never say a word to make those who don't know of his honesty
believe that it is there. He has one foot in the grave before his
neighbours have learned that he is possessed of an article for the use of
which they would so willingly have paid, could they have been made to see
that it was there. The dishonest man almost doubts whether in him
dishonesty is dishonest, let it be practised ever so widely. The honest
man almost doubts whether his honesty be honest, unless it be kept hidden.
Let two unknown men be competitors for any place, with nothing to guide
the judges but their own words and their own looks, and who can doubt but
the dishonest man would be chosen rather than the honest? Honesty goes
about with a hang-dog look about him, as though knowing that he cannot be
trusted till he be proved. Dishonesty carries his eyes high, and assumes
that any question respecting him must be considered to be unnecessary."

"Oh, Frank, what a philosopher you are."

"Well, yes; meditating about your diamonds has brought my philosophy out.
When do you think you will go to Scotland?"

"I am hardly strong enough for the journey yet. I fear the cold so much."

"You would not find it cold there by the seaside. To tell you the truth,
Lizzie, I want to get you out of this house. I don't mean to say a word
against Mrs. Carbuncle; but after all that has occurred, it would be
better that you should be away. People talk about you and Lord George."

"How can I help it, Frank?"

"By going away--that is, if I may presume one thing. I don't want to pry
into your secrets."

"I have none from you."

"Unless there be truth in the assertion that you are engaged to marry Lord
George Carruthers."

"There is no truth in it."

"And you do not wish to stay here in order that there may be an
engagement? I am obliged to ask you home questions, Lizzie, as I could not
otherwise advise you."

"You do, indeed, ask home questions."

"I will desist at once, if they be disagreeable."

"Frank, you are false to me." As she said this she rose in her bed, and
sat with her eyes fixed upon his, and her thin hands stretched out upon
the bedclothes. "You know that I cannot wish to be engaged to him or to
any other man. You know, better almost than I can know myself, how my
heart stands. There has, at any rate, been no hypocrisy with me in regard
to you. Everything has been told to you--at what cost I will not now say.
The honest woman, I fear, fares worse even than the honest man of whom you
spoke. I think you admitted that he would be appreciated at last. She to
her dying day must pay the penalty of her transgressions. Honesty in a
woman the world never forgives." When she had done speaking, he sat silent
by her bedside, but, almost unconsciously, he stretched out his left hand
and took her right hand in his. For a few seconds she admitted this, and
she lay there with their hands clasped. Then with a start she drew back
her arm, and retreated as it were from his touch. "How dare you," said
she, "press my hand when you know that such pressure from you is
treacherous and damnable?"

"Damnable, Lizzie!"

"Yes--damnable. I will not pick my words for you. Coming from you, what
does such pressure mean?"

"Affection."

"Yes--and of what sort? You are wicked enough to feed my love by such
tokens, when you know that you do not mean to return it. Oh, Frank, Frank,
will you give me back my heart? What was it that you promised me when we
sat together upon the rocks at Portray?"

It is inexpressibly difficult for a man to refuse the tender of a woman's
love. We may almost say that a man should do so as a matter of course--
that the thing so offered becomes absolutely valueless by the offer--that
the woman who can make it has put herself out of court by her own
abandonment of privileges due to her as a woman--that stern rebuke and
even expressed contempt are justified by such conduct--and that the
fairest beauty and most alluring charms of feminine grace should lose
their attraction when thus tendered openly in the market. No doubt such is
our theory as to love and lovemaking. But the action to be taken by us in
matters as to which the plainest theory prevails for the guidance of our
practice, depends so frequently on accompanying circumstances and
correlative issues, that the theory, as often as not, falls to the ground.
Frank could not despise this woman, and could not be stern to her. He
could not bring himself to tell her boldly that he would have nothing to
say to her in the way of love. He made excuses for her, and persuaded
himself that there were peculiar circumstances in her position justifying
unwomanly conduct, although, had he examined himself on the subject, he
would have found it difficult to say what those circumstances were. She
was rich, beautiful, clever--and he was flattered. Nevertheless he knew
that he could not marry her; and he knew also that much as he liked her he
did not love her. "Lizzie," he said, "I think you hardly understand my
position."

"Yes, I do. That little girl has cozened you out of a promise."

"If it be so, you would not have me break it?"

"Yes, I would, if you think she is not fit to be your wife. Is a man such
as you are, to be tied by the leg for life, have all his ambition clipped,
and his high hopes shipwrecked, because a girl has been clever enough to
extract a word from him? Is it not true that you are in debt?"

"What of that? At any rate, Lizzie, I do not want help from you."

"That is so like a man's pride! Do we not all know that in such a career
as you have marked out for yourself, wealth, or at any rate an easy
income, is necessary? Do you think that I cannot put two and two together?
Do you believe so meanly of me as to imagine that I should have said to
you what I have said, if I did not know that I could help you? A man, I
believe, cannot understand that love which induces a woman to sacrifice
her pride simply for his advantage. I want to see you prosper. I want to
see you a great man and a lord, and I know that you cannot become so
without an income. Ah, I wish I could give you all that I have got, and
save you from the encumbrance that is attached to it!"

It might be that he would then have told her of his engagement to Lucy,
and of his resolution to adhere to that promise, had not Mrs. Carbuncle at
that moment entered the room. Frank had been there for above an hour, and
as Lizzie was still an invalid, and to some extent under the care of Mrs.
Carbuncle, it was natural that that lady should interfere. "You know, my
dear, you should not exhaust yourself altogether. Mr. Emilius is to come
to you this afternoon."

"Mr. Emilius!" said Greystock.

"Yes--the clergyman. Don't you remember him at Portray? A dark man with
eyes close together! You used to be very wicked, and say that he was once
a Jew boy in the streets." Lizzie, as she spoke of her spiritual guide,
was evidently not desirous of doing him much honour.

"I remember him well enough. He made sheep's eyes at Miss Macnulty, and
drank a great deal of wine at dinner."

"Poor Macnulty! I don't believe a word about the wine; and as for
Macnulty, I don't see why she should not be converted as well as another.
He is coming here to read to me. I hope you don't object."

"Not in the least--if you like it."

"One does have solemn thoughts sometimes, Frank--especially when one is
ill."

"Oh, yes. Well or ill, one does have solemn thoughts--ghosts, as it were,
which will appear. But is Mr. Emilius good at laying such apparitions?"

"He is a clergyman, Mr. Greystock," said Mrs. Carbuncle, with something of
rebuke in her voice.

"So they tell me. I was not present at his ordination, but I dare say it
was done according to rule. When one reflects what a deal of harm a bishop
may do, one wishes that there was some surer way of getting bishops."

"Do you know anything against Mr. Emilius?" asked Lizzie.

"Nothing at all but his looks, and manners, and voice, unless it be that
he preaches popular sermons, and drinks too much wine, and makes sheep's
eyes at Miss Macnulty. Look after your silver spoons, Mrs. Carbuncle, if
the last thieves have left you any. You were asking after the fate of your
diamonds, Lizzie. Perhaps they will endow a Protestant church in Mr.
Emilius's native land."

Mr. Emilius did come and read to Lady Eustace that afternoon. A clergyman
is as privileged to enter the bedroom of a sick lady as is a doctor or a
cousin. There was another clean cap, and another laced handkerchief, and
on this occasion a little shawl over Lizzie's shoulders. Mr. Emilius first
said a prayer, kneeling at Lizzie's bedside; then he read a chapter in the
Bible; and after that he read the first half of the fourth canto of Childe
Harold so well, that Lizzie felt for the moment that after all poetry was
life, and life was poetry.




CHAPTER LIV

"I SUPPOSE I MAY SAY A WORD"


The second robbery to which Lady Eustace had been subjected by no means
decreased the interest which was attached to her and her concerns in the
fashionable world. Parliament had now met, and the party at Matching
Priory, Lady Glencora Palliser's party in the country, had been to some
extent broken up. All those gentlemen who were engaged in the service of
Her Majesty's Government had necessarily gone to London, and they who had
wives at Matching had taken their wives with them. Mr. and Mrs. Bonteen
had seen the last of their holiday; Mr. Palliser himself was, of course,
at his post; and all the private secretaries were with the public
secretaries on the scene of action. On the 13th of February Mr. Palliser
made his first great statement in Parliament on the matter of the five-
farthinged penny, and pledged himself to do his very best to carry that
stupendous measure through Parliament in the present session. The City men
who were in the House that night, and all the directors of the Bank of
England, were in the gallery, and every chairman of a great banking
company, and every Baring and every Rothschild, if there be Barings and
Rothschilds who have not been returned by constituencies, and have not
seats in the House by right, agreed in declaring that the job in hand was
too much for any one member or any one session. Some said that such a
measure never could be passed, because the unfinished work of one session
could not be used in lessening the labours of the next. Everything must be
recommenced; and therefore, so said these hopeless ones, the penny with
five farthings, the penny of which a hundred would make ten shillings, the
halcyon penny which would make all future pecuniary calculations easy to
the meanest British capacity, could never become the law of the land.
Others, more hopeful, were willing to believe that gradually the thing
would so sink into the minds of members of Parliament, of writers of
leading articles, and of the active public generally, as to admit of
certain established axioms being taken as established, and placed, as it
were, beyond the procrastinating power of debate. It might, for instance,
at last be taken for granted that a decimal system was desirable, so that
a month or two of the spring need not be consumed on that preliminary
question. But this period had not as yet been reached, and it was thought
by the entire City that Mr. Palliser was much too sanguine. It was so
probable, many said, that he might kill himself by labour which would be
Herculean in all but success, and that no financier after him would
venture to face the task. It behooved Lady Glencora to see that her
Hercules did not kill himself.

In this state of affairs Lady Glencora, into whose hands the custody of
Mr. Palliser's uncle, the duke, had now altogether fallen, had a divided
duty between Matching and London. When the members of Parliament went up
to London, she went there also, leaving some half-dozen friends whom she
could trust to amuse the duke; but she soon returned, knowing that there
might be danger in a long absence. The duke, though old, was his own
master; he much affected the company of Madame Goesler, and that lady's
kindness to him was considerate and incessant; but there might still be
danger, and Lady Glencora felt that she was responsible that the old
nobleman should do nothing, in the feebleness of age, to derogate from the
splendour of his past life. What if some day his grace should be off to
Paris and insist on making Madame Goesler a duchess in the chapel of the
Embassy? Madame Goesler had hitherto behaved very well; would probably
continue to behave well. Lady Glencora really loved Madame Goesler. But
then the interests at stake were very great! So circumstanced, Lady
Glencora found herself compelled to be often on the road between Matching
and London.

But though she was burthened with great care, Lady Glencora by no means
dropped her interest in the Eustace diamonds; and when she learned that on
the top of the great Carlisle robbery a second robbery had been
superadded, and that this had been achieved while all the London police
were yet astray about the former operation, her solicitude was of course
enhanced. The duke himself, too, took the matter up so strongly that he
almost wanted to be carried up to London, with some view, as it was
supposed by the ladies who were so good to him, of seeing Lady Eustace
personally.

"It's out of the question, my dear," Lady Glencora said to Madame Goesler,
when the duke's fancy was first mentioned to her by that lady.

"I told him that the trouble would be too much for him."

"Of course it would be too much," said Lady Glencora. "It is quite out of
the question." Then after a moment she added, in a whisper, "Who knows but
what he'd insist on marrying her? It isn't every woman that can resist
temptation." Madame Goesler smiled and shook her head, but made no answer
to Lady Glencora's suggestion. Lady Glencora assured her uncle that
everything should be told to him. She would write about it daily, and send
him the latest news by the wires if the post should be too slow.

"Ah, yes," said the duke. "I like telegrams best. I think, you know, that
that Lord George Carruthers had had something to do with it. Don't you,
Madame Goesler?" It had long been evident that the duke was anxious that
one of his own order should be proved to have been the thief, as the
plunder taken was so lordly.

In regard to Lizzie herself, Lady Glencora, on her return to London, took
it into her head to make a diversion in our heroine's favour. It had
hitherto been a matter of faith with all the liberal party that Lady
Eustace had had something to do with stealing her own diamonds. That
_esprit de corps_ which is the glorious characteristic of English
statesmen had caused the whole Government to support Lord Fawn, and Lord
Fawn could be supported only on the supposition that Lizzie Eustace had
been a wicked culprit. But Lady Glencora, though very true as a
politician, was apt to have opinions of her own, and to take certain
flights in which she chose that others of the party should follow her. She
now expressed an opinion that Lady Eustace was a victim, and all the Mrs.
Bonteens, with some even of the Mr. Bonteens, found themselves compelled
to agree with her. She stood too high among her set to be subject to that
obedience which restrained others; too high, also, for others to resist
her leading. As a member of a party she was erratic and dangerous, but
from her position and peculiar temperament she was powerful. When she
declared that poor Lady Eustace was a victim, others were obliged to say
so too. This was particularly hard upon Lord Fawn, and the more so as Lady
Glencora took upon her to assert that Lord Fawn had no right to jilt the
young woman. And Lady Glencora had this to support her views--that for the
last week past, indeed ever since the depositions which had been taken
after the robbery in Hertford Street, the police had expressed no fresh
suspicions in regard to Lizzie Eustace. She heard daily from Barrington
Erie that Major Mackintosh and Bunfit and Gager were as active as ever in
their inquiries, that all Scotland Yard was determined to unravel the
mystery, and that there were emissaries at work tracking the diamonds at
Hamburg, Paris, Vienna, and New York. It had been whispered to Mr. Erie
that the whereabouts of Patience Crabstick had been discovered, and that
many of the leading thieves in London were assisting the police; but
nothing more was done in the way of fixing any guilt upon Lizzie Eustace.
"Upon my word, I am beginning to think that she has been more sinned
against than sinning." This was said to Lady Glencora on the morning after
Mr. Palliser's great speech about the five farthings, by Barrington Erie,
who, as it seemed, had been specially told off by the party to watch this
investigation.

"I am sure she has had nothing to do with it. I have thought so ever since
the last robbery. Sir Simon Slope told me yesterday afternoon that Mr.
Camperdown has given it up altogether." Sir Simon Slope was the Solicitor-
General of that day.

"It would be absurd for him to go on with his bill in Chancery now that
the diamonds are gone, unless he meant to make her pay for them."

"That would be rank persecution. Indeed, she has been persecuted. I shall
call upon her." Then she wrote the following letter to the duke:

"FEBRUARY 14, 18--.

"MY DEAR DUKE: Plantagenet was on his legs last night for three hours and
three-quarters, and I sat through it all. As far as I could observe
through the bars I was the only person in the House who listened to him.
I'm sure Mr. Gresham was fast asleep. It was quite piteous to see some of
them yawning. Plantagenet did it very well, and I almost think I
understood him. They seem to say that nobody on the other side will take
trouble enough to make a regular opposition, but there are men in the City
who will write letters to the newspapers, and get up a sort of Bank
clamour. Plantagenet says nothing about it, but there is a do-or-die
manner with him which is quite tragical. The House was up at eleven, when
he came home and eat three oysters; drank a glass of beer, and slept well.
They say the real work will come when it's in Committee; that is, if it
gets there. The bill is to be brought in, and will be read the first time
next Monday week.

"As to the robberies, I believe there is no doubt that the police have got
hold of the young woman. They don't arrest her, but deal with her in a
friendly sort of way. Barrington Erle says that a sergeant is to marry her
in order to make quite sure of her. I suppose they know their business;
but that wouldn't strike me as being the safest way. They seem to think
the diamonds went to Paris, but have since been sent on to New York.

"As to the little widow, I do believe she has been made a victim. She
first lost her diamonds, and now her other jewels and her money have gone.
I cannot see what she was to gain by treachery, and I think she has been
ill-used. She is staying at the house of that Mrs. Carbuncle, but all the
same I shall go and call on her. I wish you could see her, because she is
such a little beauty, just what you would like; not so much colour as our
friend, but perfect features, with infinite play, not perhaps always in
the best taste; but then we can't have everything, can we, dear duke?

"As to the real thief--of course you must burn this at once, and keep it
strictly private as coming from me--I fancy that delightful Scotch lord
managed it entirely. The idea is, that he did it on commission for the Jew
jewellers. I don't suppose he had money enough to carry it out himself. As
to the second robbery, whether he had or had not a hand in that, I can't
make up my mind. I don't see why he shouldn't. If a man does go into a
business, he ought to make the best of it. Of course it was a poor thing
after the diamonds; but still it was worth having. There is some story
about a Sir Griffin Tewett. He's a real Sir Griffin, as you'll find by the
peerage. He was to marry a young woman, and our Lord George insists that
he shall marry her. I don't understand all about it, but the girl lives in
the same house with Lady Eustace, and if I call I shall find out. They say
that Sir Griffin knows all about the necklace, and threatens to tell
unless he is let off marrying. I rather think the girl is Lord George's
daughter, so that there is a thorough complication.

"I shall go down to Matching on Saturday. If anything turns up before
that, I'll write again, or send a message. I don't know whether
Plantagenet will be able to leave London. He says he must be back on
Monday, and that he loses too much time on the road. Kiss my little
darlings for me"--the darlings were Lady Glencora's children, and the
duke's playthings--"and give my love to Madame Max. I suppose you don't
see much of the others.

"Most affectionately yours,

"GLENCORA."

On the next day Lady Glencora actually did call in Hertford Street and saw
our friend Lizzie. She was told by the servant that Lady Eustace was in
bed; but, with her usual persistence, she asked questions, and when she
found that Lizzie did receive visitors in her room, she sent up her card.
The compliment was one much too great to be refused. Lady Glencora stood
so high in the world that her countenance would be almost as valuable as
another lover. If Lord George would keep her secret, and Lady Glencora
would be her friend, might she not still be a successful woman? So Lady
Glencora Palliser was shown up to Lizzie's chamber. Lizzie was found with
her nicest nightcap and prettiest handkerchief, with a volume of
Tennyson's poetry, and a scent-bottle. She knew that it behooved her to be
very clever at this interview. Her instinct told her that her first
greeting should show more of surprise than of gratification. Accordingly,
in a pretty, feminine, almost childish way, she was very much surprised.
"I'm doing the strangest thing in the world, I know, Lady Eustace," said
Lady Glencora with a smile.

"I'm sure you mean to do a kind thing."

"Well, yes, I do. I think we have not met since you were at my house near
the end of last season."

"No, indeed. I have been in London six weeks, but have not been out much.
For the last fortnight I have been in bed. I have had things to trouble me
so much that they have made me ill."

"So I have heard, Lady Eustace, and I have just come to offer you my
sympathy. When I was told that you did see people, I thought that perhaps
you would admit me."

"So willingly, Lady Glencora!"

"I have heard, of course, of your terrible losses."

"The loss has been as nothing to the vexation that has accompanied it. I
don't know how to speak of it. Ladies have lost their jewels before now,
but I don't know that any lady before me has ever been accused of stealing
them herself."

"There has been no accusation, surely?"

"I haven't exactly been put in prison, Lady Glencora, but I have had
policemen here wanting to search my things; and then you know yourself
what reports have been spread."

"Oh, yes, I do. Only for that, to tell you plainly, I should hardly have
been here now." Then Lady Glencora poured out her sympathy--perhaps with
more eloquence and grace than discretion. She was, at any rate, both
graceful and eloquent. "As for the loss of the diamonds, I think you bear
it wonderfully," said Lady Glencora.

"If you could imagine how little I care about it!" said Lizzie with
enthusiasm. "They had lost the delight which I used to feel in them as a
present from my husband. People had talked about them, and I had been
threatened because I chose to keep what I knew to be my own. Of course I
would not give them up. Would you have given them up, Lady Glencora?"

"Certainly not."

"Nor would I. But when once all that had begun, they became an
irrepressible burden to me. I often used to say that I would throw them
into the sea."

"I don't think I would have done that," said Lady Glencora.

"Ah--you have never suffered as I have suffered."

"We never know where each other's shoes pinch each other's toes."

"You have never been left desolate. You have a husband and friends."

"A husband that wants to put five farthings into a penny! All is not gold
that glistens, Lady Eustace."

"You can never have known trials such as mine," continued Lizzie, not
understanding in the least her new friend's allusion to the great currency
question. "Perhaps you may have heard that in the course of last summer I
became engaged to marry a nobleman, with whom I am aware that you are
acquainted." This she said in her softest whisper.

"Oh, yes--Lord Fawn. I know him very well. Of course I heard of it. We all
heard of it."

"And you have heard how he has treated me?"

"Yes--indeed."

"I will say nothing about him--to you, Lady Glencora. It would not be
proper that I should do so. But all that came of this wretched necklace.
After that, can you wonder that I should say that I wish these stones had
been thrown into the sea?"

"I suppose Lord Fawn will--will come all right again now?" said Lady
Glencora.

"All right!" exclaimed Lizzie in astonishment.

"His objection to the marriage will now be over."

"I'm sure I do not in the least know what are his lordship's views," said
Lizzie in scorn, "and, to tell the truth, I do not very much care."

"What I mean is, that he didn't like you to have the Eustace diamonds----"

"They were not Eustace diamonds. They were my diamonds."

"But he did not like you to have them; and as they are now gone--
forever----"

"Oh, yes, they are gone forever."

"His objection is gone too. Why don't you write to him, and make him come
and see you? That's what I should do."

Lizzie, of course, repudiated vehemently any idea of forcing Lord Fawn
into a marriage which had become distasteful to him--let the reason be
what it might.

"His lordship is perfectly free, as far as I am concerned," said Lizzie
with a little show of anger. But all this Lady Glencora took at its worth.
Lizzie Eustace had been a good deal knocked about, and Lady Glencora did
not doubt but that she would be very glad to get back her betrothed
husband. The little woman had suffered hardships, so thought Lady
Glencora--and a good thing would be done by bringing her into fashion, and
setting the marriage up again. As to Lord Fawn--the fortune was there, as
good now as it had been when he first sought it; and the lady was very
pretty, a baronet's widow too--and in all respects good enough for Lord
Fawn. A very pretty little baronet's widow she was, with four thousand a
year, and a house in Scotland, and a history. Lady Glencora determined
that she would remake the match. "I think, you know, friends who have been
friends should be brought together. I suppose I may say a word to Lord
Fawn?" Lizzie hesitated would be sweet to her. She had sworn that she
would be revenged upon Lord Fawn. After all, might it not suit her best to
carry out her oath by marrying him? But whether so or otherwise, it could
not but be well for her that he should be again at her feet. "Yes, if you
think good will come of it." The acquiescence was given with much
hesitation; but the circumstances required that it should be so, and Lady
Glencora fully understood the circumstances. When she took her leave,
Lizzie was profuse in her gratitude. "Oh, Lady Glencora, it has been so
good of you to come. Pray come again, if you can spare me another moment."
Lady Glencora said that she would come again.

During the visit she had asked some question concerning Lucinda and Sir
Griffin, and had been informed that that marriage was to go on. A hint had
been thrown out as to Lucinda's parentage; but Lizzie had not understood
the hint, and the question had not been pressed.




CHAPTER LV

QUINTS OR SEMITENTHS


The task which Lady Glencora had taken upon herself was not a very easy
one. No doubt Lord Fawn was a man subservient to the leaders of his party,
much afraid of the hard judgment of those with whom, he was concerned,
painfully open to impression from what he would have called public
opinion, to a certain extent a coward, most anxious to do right so that he
might not be accused of being in the wrong, and at the same time gifted
with but little of that insight into things which teaches men to know what
is right and what is wrong. Lady Glencora, having perceived all this, felt
that he was a man upon whom a few words from her might have an effect. But
even Lady Glencora might hesitate to tell a gentleman that he ought to
marry a lady, when the gentleman had already declared his intention of not
marrying and had attempted to justify his decision almost publicly by a
reference to the lady's conduct! Lady Glencora almost felt that she had
undertaken too much as she turned over in her mind the means she had of
performing her promise to Lady Eustace.

The five-farthing bill had been laid upon the table on a Tuesday, and was
to be read the first time on the following Monday week. On the Wednesday
Lady Glencora had written to the duke, and had called in Hertford Street.
On the following Sunday she was at Matching, looking after the duke; but
she returned to London on the Tuesday, and on the Wednesday there was a
little dinner at Mr. Palliser's house, given avowedly with the object of
further friendly discussion respecting the new Palliser penny. The prime
minister was to be there, and Mr. Bonteen, and Barrington Erle, and those
special members of the Government who would be available for giving
special help to the financial Hercules of the day. A question, perhaps of
no great practical importance, had occurred to Mr. Palliser, but one
which, if overlooked, might be fatal to the ultimate success of the
measure. There is so much in a name, and then an ounce of ridicule is
often more potent than a hundredweight of argument. By what denomination
should the fifth part of a penny be hereafter known? Some one had, ill-
naturedly, whispered to Mr. Palliser that a farthing meant a fourth, and
at once there arose a new trouble, which for a time bore very heavily on
him. Should he boldly disregard the original meaning of the useful old
word; or should he venture on the dangers of new nomenclature? October, as
he said to himself, is still the tenth month of the year, November the
eleventh, and so on, though by these names they are so plainly called the
eighth and ninth. All France tried to rid itself of this absurdity and
failed. Should he stick by the farthing; or should he call it a fifthing,
a quint, or a semitenth? "There's the 'Fortnightly Review' comes out but
once a month," he said to his friend Mr. Bonteen, "and I'm told that it
does very well." Mr. Bonteen, who was a rational man, thought the "Review"
would do better if it were called by a more rational name, and was very
much in favour of "a quint." Mr. Gresham had expressed an opinion,
somewhat off hand, that English people would never be got to talk about
quints, and so there was a difficulty. A little dinner was therefore
arranged, and Mr. Palliser, as was his custom in such matters, put the
affair of the dinner into his wife's hands. When he was told that she had
included Lord Fawn among the guests he opened his eyes. Lord Fawn, who
might be good enough at the India Office, knew literally nothing about the
penny.

"He'll take it as the greatest compliment in the world," said Lady
Glencora.

"I don't want to pay Lord Fawn a compliment," said Mr. Palliser.

"But I do," said Lady Glencora. And so the matter was arranged.

It was a very nice little dinner. Mrs. Gresham and Mrs. Bonteen were
there, and the great question of the day was settled in two minutes,
before the guests went out of the drawing-room.

"Stick to your farthing," said Mr. Gresham.

"I think so," said Mr. Palliser.

"Quint's a very easy word," said Mr. Bonteen.

"But squint is an easier," said Mr. Gresham, with all a prime minister's
jocose authority.

"They'd certainly be called cock-eyes," said Barrington Erie.

"There's nothing of the sound of a quarter in farthing," said Mr.
Palliser.

"Stick to the old word," said Mr. Gresham. And so the matter was decided
while Lady Glencora was flattering Lord Fawn as to the manner in which he
had finally arranged the affair of the Sawab of Mygawb. Then they went
down to dinner, and not a word more was said that evening about the new
penny by Mr. Palliser.

Before dinner Lady Glencora had exacted a promise from Lord Fawn that he
would return to the drawing-room. Lady Glencora was very clever at such
work, and said nothing then of her purpose. She did not want her guests to
run away, and therefore Lord Fawn--Lord Fawn especially--must stay. If he
were to go there would be nothing spoken of all the evening, but that
weary new penny. To oblige her he must remain; and, of course, he did
remain. "Whom do you think I saw the other day?" said Lady Glencora, when
she got her victim into a corner. Of course Lord Fawn had no idea whom she
might have seen. Up to that moment no suspicion of what was coming upon
him had crossed his mind. "I called upon poor Lady Eustace and found her
in bed." Then did Lord Fawn blush up to the roots of his hair, and for a
moment he was stricken dumb. "I do feel for her so much! I think she has
been so hardly used!"

He was obliged to say something. "My name has of course been much mixed up
with hers."

"Yes, Lord Fawn, I know it has. And it is because I am so sure of your
high-minded generosity and--and thorough devotion, that I have ventured to
speak to you. I am sure there is nothing you would wish so much as to get
at the truth."

"Certainly, Lady Glencora."

"All manner of stories have been told about her, and, as I believe,
without the slightest foundation. They tell me now that she had an
undoubted right to keep the diamonds; that even if Sir Florian did not
give them to her, they were hers under his will. Those lawyers have given
up all idea of proceeding against her."

"Because the necklace has been stolen."

"Altogether independently of that. Do you see Mr. Eustace, and ask him if
what I say is not true. If it had not been her own she would have been
responsible for the value, even though it were stolen; and with such a
fortune as hers they would never have allowed her to escape. They were as
bitter against her as they could be; weren't they?"

"Mr. Camperdown thought that the property should be given up."

"Oh yes; that's the man's name; a horrid man. I am told that he was really
most cruel to her. And then, because a lot of thieves had got about her--
after the diamonds, you know, like flies round a honeypot--and took first
her necklace and then her money, they were impudent enough to say that she
had stolen her own things!"

"I don't think they quite said that, Lady Glencora."

"Something very much like it, Lord Fawn. I have no doubt in my own mind
who did steal all the things."

"Who was it?"

"Oh, one mustn't mention names in such an affair without evidence. At any
rate she has been very badly treated, and I shall take her up. If I were
you I would go and call upon her. I would indeed. I think you owe it to
her. Well, duke, what do you think of Plantagenet's penny now? Will it
ever be worth two half-pence?" This question was asked of the Duke of St.
Bungay, a great nobleman whom all Liberals loved, and a member of the
Cabinet. He had come in since dinner, and had been asking a question or
two as to what had been decided.

"Well, yes; if properly invested I think it will. I'm glad it is not to
contain five semitenths. A semitenth would never have been a popular form
of money in England. We hate new names so much that we have not yet got
beyond talking of fourpenny bits."

"There's a great deal in a name, isn't there? You don't think they'll call
them Pallisers, or Palls, or anything of that sort, do you? I shouldn't
like to hear that under the new regime two lollypops were to cost three
Palls. But they say it never can be carried this session, and we sha'n't
be in, in the next year."

"Who says so? Don't be such a prophetess of evil, Lady Glencora. I mean to
be in for the next three sessions, and I mean to see Palliser's measure
carried through the House of Lords next session. I shall be paying for my
mutton chops at so many quints a chop yet. Don't you think so, Fawn?"

"I don't know what to think," said Lord Fawn, whose mind was intent on
other matters. After that he left the room as quickly as he could, and
escaped out into the street. His mind was very much disturbed. If Lady
Glencora was determined to take up the cudgels for the woman he had
rejected, the comfort and peace of his life would be over. He knew well
enough how strong was Lady Glencora.




CHAPTER LVI

JOB'S COMFORTERS


Mrs. Carbuncle and Lady Eustace had now been up in town between six and
seven weeks, and the record of their doings has necessarily dealt chiefly
with robberies and the rumours of robberies. But at intervals the minds of
the two ladies had been intent on other things. The former was still
intent on marrying her niece, Lucinda Roanoke, to Sir Griffin, and the
latter had never for a moment forgotten the imperative duty which lay upon
her of revenging herself upon Lord Fawn. The match between Sir Griffin and
Lucinda was still to be a match. Mrs. Carbuncle persevered in the teeth
both of the gentleman and or the lady, and still promised herself success.
And our Lizzie, in the midst of all her troubles, had not been idle. In
doing her justice we must acknowledge that she had almost abandoned the
hope of becoming Lady Fawn. Other hopes and other ambitions had come upon
her. Latterly the Corsair had been all in all to her, with exceptional
moments in which she told herself that her heart belonged exclusively to
her cousin Frank. But Lord Fawn's offences were not to be forgotten, and
she continually urged upon her cousin the depth of the wrongs which she
had suffered.

On the part of Frank Greystock there was certainly no desire to let the
Under-Secretary escape. It is hoped that the reader, to whom every tittle
of this story has been told without reserve, and every secret unfolded,
will remember that others were not treated with so much open candour. The
reader knows much more of Lizzie Eustace than did her cousin Frank. He,
indeed, was not quite in love with Lizzie; but to him she was a pretty,
graceful young woman, to whom he was bound by many ties, and who had been
cruelly injured. Dangerous she was doubtless, and perhaps a little
artificial. To have had her married to Lord Fawn would have been a good
thing, and would still be a good thing. According to all the rules known
in such matters Lord Fawn was bound to marry her. He had become engaged to
her, and Lizzie had done nothing to forfeit her engagement. As to the
necklace, the plea made for jilting her on that ground was a disgraceful
pretext. Everybody was beginning to perceive that Mr. Camperdown would
never have succeeded in getting the diamonds from her, even if they had
not been stolen. It was "preposterous," as Frank said over and over again
to his friend Herriot, that a man when he was engaged to a lady, should
take upon himself to judge her conduct as Lord Fawn had done, and then
ride out of his engagement on a verdict found by himself. Frank had
therefore willingly displayed alacrity in persecuting his lordship, and
had not been altogether without hope that he might drive the two into a
marriage yet, in spite of the protestations made by Lizzie at Portray.

Lord Fawn had certainly not spent a happy winter. Between Mrs. Hittaway on
one side and Frank Greystock on the other, his life had been a burthen to
him. It had been suggested to him by various people that he was behaving
badly to the lady, who was represented as having been cruelly misused by
fortune and by himself. On the other hand it had been hinted to him, that
nothing was too bad to believe of Lizzie Eustace, and that no calamity
could be so great as that by which he would be overwhelmed were he still
to allow himself to be forced into that marriage. "It would be better,"
Mrs. Hittaway had said, "to retire to Ireland at once and cultivate your
demesne in Tipperary." This was a grievous sentence, and one which had
greatly excited the brother's wrath; but it had shown how very strong was
his sister's opinion against the lady to whom he had unfortunately offered
his hand. Then there came to him a letter from Mr. Greystock, in which he
was asked for his "written explanation." If there be a proceeding which an
official man dislikes worse than another, it is a demand for a written
explanation. "It is impossible," Frank had said, "that your conduct to my
cousin should be allowed to drop without further notice. Hers has been
without reproach. Your engagement with her has been made public, chiefly
by you, and it is out of the question that she should be treated as you
are treating her, and that your lordship should escape without
punishment." What the punishment was to be he did not say; but there did
come a punishment on Lord Fawn from the eyes of every man whose eyes met
his own, and in the tones of every voice that addressed him. The looks of
the very clerks in the India Office accused him of behaving badly to a
young woman, and the doorkeeper at the House of Lords seemed to glance
askance at him. And now Lady Glencora, who was the social leader of his
own party, the feminine pole-star of the Liberal heavens, the most popular
and the most daring woman in London, had attacked him personally, and told
him that he ought to call on Lady Eustace!

Let it not for a moment be supposed that Lord Fawn was without conscience
in the matter or indifferent to moral obligations. There was not a man in
London less willing to behave badly to a young woman than Lord Fawn; or
one who would more diligently struggle to get back to the right path, if
convinced that he was astray. But he was one who detested interference in
his private matters, and who was nearly driven mad between his sister and
Frank Greystock. When he left Lady Glencora's house he walked toward his
own abode with a dark cloud upon his brow. He was at first very angry with
Lady Glencora. Even her position gave her no right to meddle with his most
private affairs as she had done. He would resent it, and would quarrel
with Lady Glencora. What right could she have to advise him to call upon
any woman? But by degrees this wrath died away, and gave place to fears,
and qualms, and inward questions. He, too, had found a change in general
opinion about the diamonds. When he had taken upon himself with a high
hand to dissolve his own engagement, everybody had, as he thought,
acknowledged that Lizzie Eustace was keeping property which did not belong
to her. Now people talked of her losses as though the diamonds had been
undoubtedly her own. On the next morning Lord Fawn took an opportunity of
seeing Mr. Camperdown.

"My dear lord," said Mr. Camperdown, "I shall wash my hands of the matter
altogether. The diamonds are gone, and the questions now are, who stole
them, and where are they? In our business we can't meddle with such
questions as those."

"You will drop the bill in Chancery then?"

"What good can the bill do us when the diamonds are gone? If Lady Eustace
had anything to do with the robbery----"

"You suspect her, then?"

"No, my lord; no. I cannot say that. I have no right to say that. Indeed
it is not Lady Eustace that I suspect. She has got into bad hands,
perhaps; but I do not think that she is a thief."

"You were suggesting that, if she had anything to do with the robbery----"

"Well; yes; if she had, it would not be for us to take steps against her
in the matter. In fact, the trustees have decided that they will do
nothing more, and my hands are tied. If the minor, when he comes of age,
claims the property from them, they will prefer to replace it. It isn't
very likely; but that's what they say."

"But if it was an heirloom--," suggested Lord Fawn, going back to the old
claim.

"That's exploded," said Mr. Camperdown. "Mr. Dove was quite clear about
that."

This was the end of the filing of that bill in Chancery as to which Mr.
Camperdown had been so very enthusiastic! Now it certainly was the case
that poor Lord Fawn in his conduct toward Lizzie had trusted greatly to
the support of Mr. Camperdown's legal proceeding. The world could hardly
have expected him to marry a woman against whom a bill in Chancery was
being carried on for the recovery of diamonds which did not belong to her.
But that support was now altogether withdrawn from him. It was
acknowledged that the necklace was not an heirloom, clearly acknowledged
by Mr. Camperdown! And even Mr. Camperdown would not express an opinion
that the lady had stolen her own diamonds.

How would it go with him, if, after all, he were to marry her? The bone of
contention between them had at any rate been made to vanish. The income
was still there, and Lady Glencora Palliser had all but promised her
friendship. As he entered the India Office on his return from Mr.
Camperdown's chambers, he almost thought that that would be the best way
out of his difficulty. In his room he found his brother-in-law, Mr.
Hittaway, waiting for him. It is almost necessary that a man should have
some friend whom he can trust in delicate affairs, and Mr. Hittaway was
selected as Lord Fawn's friend. He was not at all points the man whom Lord
Fawn would have chosen, but for their close connection. Mr. Hittaway was
talkative, perhaps a little loud, and too apt to make capital out of every
incident of his life. But confidential friends are not easily found, and
one does not wish to increase the circle to whom one's family secrets must
become known. Mr. Hittaway was at any rate zealous for the Fawn family,
and then his character as an official man stood high. He had been asked on
the previous evening to step across from the Civil Appeal Office to give
his opinion respecting that letter from Frank Greystock demanding a
written explanation. The letter had been sent to him; and Mr. Hittaway had
carried it home and shown it to his wife. "He's a cantankerous Tory, and
determined to make himself disagreeable," said Mr. Hittaway, taking the
letter from his pocket and beginning the conversation. Lord Fawn seated
himself in his great armchair, and buried his face in his hands. "I am
disposed, after much consideration, to advise you to take no notice of the
letter," said Mr. Hittaway, giving his counsel in accordance with
instructions received from his wife. Lord Fawn still buried his face. "Of
course the thing is painful, very painful. But out of two evils one should
choose the least. The writer of this letter is altogether unable to carry
out his threat."

"What can the man do to him!" Mrs. Hittaway had asked, almost snapping at
her husband as she did so.

"And then," continued Mr. Hittaway, "we all know that public opinion is
with you altogether. The conduct of Lady Eustace is notorious."

"Everybody is taking her part," said Lord Fawn, almost crying.

"Surely not."

"Yes; they are. The bill in Chancery has been withdrawn, and it's my
belief that if the necklace were found to-morrow, there would be nothing
to prevent her keeping it, just as she did before."

"But it was an heirloom?"

"No, it wasn't. The lawyers were all wrong about it. As far as I can see,
lawyers always are wrong. About those nine lacs of rupees for the sawab,
Finlay was all wrong. Camperdown owns that he was wrong. If, after all,
the diamonds were hers, I'm sure I don't know what I am to do. Thank you,
Hittaway, for coming over. That'll do for the present. Just leave that
ruffian's letter, and I'll think about it."

This was considered by Mrs. Hittaway to be a very bad state of things, and
there was great consternation in Warwick Square when Mr. Hittaway told his
wife this new story of her brother's weakness. She was not going to be
weak. She did not intend to withdraw her opposition to the marriage. She
was not going to be frightened by Lizzie Eustace and Frank Greystock,
knowing as she did that they were lovers, and very improper lovers, too.
"Of course she stole them herself," said Mrs. Hittaway; "and I don't doubt
but she stole her own money afterwards There's nothing she wouldn't do.
I'd sooner see Frederic in his grave than married to such a woman as that.
Men don't know how sly women can be; that's the truth. And Frederic has
been so spoilt among them down at Richmond, that he has no real judgment
left. I don't suppose he means to marry her."

"Upon my word I don't know," said Mr. Hittaway. Then Mrs. Hittaway made up
her mind that she would at once write a letter to Scotland.

There was an old lord about London in those days, or rather one who was an
old Liberal but a young lord, one Lord Mount Thistle, who had sat in the
Cabinet, and had lately been made a peer when his place in the Cabinet was
wanted. He was a pompous, would-be important, silly old man, well
acquainted with all the traditions of his party, and perhaps on that
account useful, but a bore, and very apt to meddle when he was not wanted.
Lady Glencora, on the day after her dinner-party, whispered into his ear
that Lord Fawn was getting himself into trouble, and that a few words of
caution, coming to him from one whom he respected so much as he did Lord
Mount Thistle, would be of service to him. Lord Mount Thistle had known
Lord Fawn's father, and declared himself at once to be quite entitled to
interfere. "He is really behaving badly to Lady Eustace," said Lady
Glencora, "and I don't think that he knows it." Lord Mount Thistle, proud
of a commission from the hands of Lady Glencora, went almost at once to
his old friend's son. He found him at the House that night, and whispered
his few words of caution in one of the lobbies.

"I know you will excuse me, Fawn," Lord Mount Thistle said, "but people
seem to think that you are not behaving quite well to Lady Eustace."

"What people?" demanded Lord Fawn.

"My dear fellow, that is a question that cannot be answered. You know that
I am the last man to interfere if I didn't think it my duty as a friend.
You were engaged to her?"--Lord Fawn only frowned. "If so," continued the
late cabinet minister, "and if you have broken it off, you ought to give
your reasons. She has a right to demand as much as that."

On the next morning, Friday, there came to him the note which Lady
Glencora had recommended Lizzie to write. It was very short. "Had you not
better come and see me? You can hardly think that things should be left as
they are now. L. E.--Hertford Street, Thursday." He had hoped--he had
ventured to hope--that things might be left, and that they would arrange
themselves; that he could throw aside his engagement without further
trouble, and that the subject would drop. But it was not so. His enemy,
Frank Greystock, had demanded from him a "written explanation" of his
conduct. Mr. Camperdown had deserted him. Lady Glencora Palliser, with
whom he had not the honour of any intimate acquaintance, had taken upon
herself to give him advice. Lord Mount Thistle had found fault with him.
And now there had come a note from Lizzie Eustace herself, which he could
hardly venture to leave altogether unnoticed. On that Friday he dined at
his club, and then went to his sister's house in Warwick Square. If
assistance might be had anywhere, it would be from his sister. She, at any
rate, would not want courage in carrying on the battle on his behalf.

"Ill-used!" she said, as soon as they were closeted together. "Who dares
to say so?"

"That old fool, Mount Thistle, has been with me."

"I hope, Frederic, you don't mind what such a man as that says. He has
probably been prompted by some friend of hers. And who else?"

"Camperdown turns round now and says that they don't mean to do anything
more about the necklace. Lady Glencora Palliser told me the other day that
all the world believes that the thing was her own."

"What does Lady Glencora Palliser know about it? If Lady Glencora Palliser
would mind her own affairs it would be much better for her. I remember
when she had troubles enough of her own, without meddling with other
people's."

"And now I've got this note." Lord Fawn had already shown Lizzie's few
scrawled words to his sister. "I think I must go and see her."

"Do no such thing, Frederic."

"Why not? I must answer it, and what can I say?"

"If you go there, that woman will be your wife, you'll never have a happy
day again as long as you live. The match is broken off, and she knows it.
I shouldn't take the slightest notice of her, or of her cousin, or of any
of them. If she chooses to bring an action against you, that is another
thing."

Lord Fawn paused for a few moments before he answered. "I think I ought to
go," he said.

"And I am sure that you ought not. It is not only about the diamonds,
though that was quite enough to break off any engagement. Have you
forgotten what I told you that the man saw at Portray?"

"I don't know that the man spoke the truth."

"But he did."

"And I hate that kind of espionage. It is so very likely that mistakes
should be made."

"When she was sitting in his arms--and kissing him! If you choose to do
it, Frederic, of course you must. We can't prevent it. You are free to
marry any one you please."

"I'm not talking of marrying her."

"What do you suppose she wants you to go there for? As for political life,
I am quite sure it would be the death of you. If I were you I wouldn't go
near her. You have got out of the scrape, and I would remain out."

"But I haven't got out," said Lord Fawn.

On the next day, Saturday, he did nothing in the matter. He went down, as
was his custom, to Richmond, and did not once mention Lizzie's name. Lady
Fawn and her daughters never spoke of her now--neither of her, nor in his
presence, of poor Lucy Morris. But on his return to London on the Sunday
evening he found another note from Lizzie. "You will hardly have the
hardihood to leave my note unanswered. Pray let me know when you will come
to me." Some answer must, as he felt, be made to her. For a moment he
thought of asking his mother to call; but he at once saw that by doing so
he might lay himself open to terrible ridicule. Could he induce Lord Mount
Thistle to be his Mercury? It would, he felt, be quite impossible to make
Lord Mount Thistle understand all the facts of his position. His sister,
Mrs. Hittaway, might have gone, were it not that she herself was violently
opposed to any visit. The more he thought of it the more convinced he
became that, should it be known that he had received two such notes from a
lady and that he had not answered or noticed them, the world would judge
him to have behaved badly. So at last he wrote--on that Sunday evening--
fixing a somewhat distant day for his visit to Hertford street. His note
was as follows:

"Lord Fawn presents his compliments to Lady Eustace. In accordance with
the wish expressed in Lady Eustace's two notes of the 23d instant and this
date, Lord Fawn will do himself the honour of waiting upon Lady Eustace on
Saturday next, March 3d, at 12, noon. Lord Fawn had thought that under
circumstances as they now exist, no further personal interview could lead
to the happiness of either party; but as Lady Eustace thinks otherwise, he
feels himself constrained to comply with her desire.

"SUNDAY EVENING, February 25, 18--."

"I am going to see her in the course of this week," he said, in answer to
a further question from Lady Glencora, who, chancing to meet him in
society, had again addressed him on the subject. He lacked the courage to
tell Lady Glencora to mind her own business and to allow him to do the
same. Had she been a little less great than she was, either as regarded
herself or her husband, he would have done so. But Lady Glencora was the
social queen of the party to which he belonged, and Mr. Palliser was
Chancellor of the Exchequer, and would some day be Duke of Omnium.

"As you are great, be merciful, Lord Fawn," said Lady Glencora. "You men,
I believe, never realise what it is that women feel when they love. It is
my belief that she will die unless you are reunited to her. And then she
is so beautiful."

"It is a subject that I cannot discuss, Lady Glencora."

"I dare say not. And I'm sure I am the last person to wish to give you
pain. But you see, if the poor lady has done nothing to merit your anger,
it does seem rather a strong measure to throw her off and give her no
reason whatever. How would you defend yourself, suppose she published it
all?" Lady Glencora's courage was very great, and perhaps we may say her
impudence also. This last question Lord Fawn left unanswered, walking away
in great dudgeon.

In the course of the week he told his sister of the interview which he had
promised, and she endeavoured to induce him to postpone it till a certain
man should arrive from Scotland. She had written for Mr. Andrew Gowran--
sending down funds for Mr. Gowran's journey--so that her brother might
hear Mr. Gowran's evidence out of Mr. Gowran's own mouth. Would not
Frederic postpone the interview till he should have seen Mr. Gowran? But
to this request Frederic declined to accede. He had fixed a day and an
hour. He had made an appointment. Of course he must keep it.




CHAPTER LVII

HUMPTY DUMPTY


The robbery at the house in Hertford Street took place on the 30th of
January, and on the morning of the 28th of February Bunfit and Gager were
sitting together in a melancholy, dark little room in Scotland Yard,
discussing the circumstances of that nefarious act. A month had gone by
and nobody was yet in custody. A month had passed since that second
robbery; but nearly eight weeks had passed since the robbery at Carlisle,
and even that was still a mystery. The newspapers had been loud in their
condemnation of the police. It had been asserted over and over again that
in no other civilised country in the world could so great an amount of
property have passed through the hands of thieves without leaving some
clue by which the police would have made their way to the truth. Major
Mackintosh had been declared to be altogether incompetent, and all the
Bunfits and Gagers of the force had been spoken of as drones and moles and
ostriches. They were idle and blind, and so stupid as to think that when
they saw nothing others saw less. The Major, who was a broad-shouldered,
philosophical man, bore all this as though it were, of necessity, a part
of the burthen of his profession: but the Bunfits and Gagers were very
angry, and at their wits' ends. It did not. occur to them to feel
animosity against the newspapers which abused them. The thieves who would
not be caught were their great enemies; and there was common to them a
conviction that men so obstinate as these thieves--men to whom a large
amount of grace and liberty for indulgence had accrued--should be treated
with uncommon severity when they were caught. There was this excuse always
on their lips, that had it been an affair simply of thieves, such as
thieves ordinarily are, everything would have been discovered long since.
But when lords and ladies with titles come to be mixed up with such an
affair--folk in whose house a policeman can't have his will at searching
and browbeating--how is a detective to detect anything? Bunfit and Gager
had both been driven to recast their theories as to the great Carlisle
affair by the circumstances of the later affair in Hertford Street. They
both thought that Lord George had been concerned in the robbery. That,
indeed, had now become the general opinion of the world at large. He was a
man of doubtful character, with large expenses, and with no recognised
means of living. He had formed a great intimacy with Lady Eustace at a
period in which she was known to be carrying these diamonds about with
her, had been staying with her at Portray Castle when the diamonds were
there, and had been her companion on the journey during which the diamonds
were stolen. The only men in London supposed to be capable of dealing
advantageously with such a property were Harter & Benjamin, as to whom it
was known that they were conversant with the existence of the diamonds,
and known also that they were in the habit of having dealings with Lord
George. It was, moreover, known that Lord George had been closeted with
Mr. Benjamin on the morning after his arrival in London. These things put
together made it almost a certainty that Lord George had been concerned in
the matter. Bunfit had always been sure of it. Gager, though differing
much from Bunfit as to details, had never been unwilling to suspect Lord
George. But the facts known could not be got to dovetail themselves
pleasantly. If Lord George had possessed himself of the diamonds at
Carlisle, or with Lizzie's connivance before they reached Carlisle, then,
why had there been a second robbery? Bunfit, who was very profound in his
theory, suggested that the second robbery was an additional plant, got up
with the view of throwing more dust into the eyes of the police. Patience
Crabstick had, of course, been one of the gang throughout, and she had now
been allowed to go off with her mistress's money and lesser trinkets, so
that the world of Scotland Yard might be thrown more and more into the
mire of ignorance and darkness of doubt. To this view Gager was altogether
opposed. He was inclined to think that Lord George had taken the diamonds
at Carlisle with Lizzie's connivance; that he had restored them in London
to her keeping, finding the suspicion against him too heavy to admit of
his dealing with them, and that now he had stolen them a second time,
again with Lizzie's connivance; but in this latter point Gager did not
pretend to the assurance of any conviction.

But Gager at the present moment had achieved a triumph in the matter which
he was not at all disposed to share with his elder officer. Perhaps, on
the whole, more power is lost than gained by habits of secrecy. To be
discreet is a fine thing, especially for a policeman; but when discretion
is carried to such a length in the direction of self-confidence as to
produce a belief that no aid is wanted for the achievement of great
results, it will often militate against all achievement. Had Scotland Yard
been less discreet and more confidential, the mystery might perhaps have
been sooner unravelled. Gager at this very moment had reason to believe
that a man whom he knew could--and would, if operated upon duly--
communicate to him, Gager, the secret of the present whereabouts of
Patience Crabstick! That belief was a great possession, and much too
important, as Gager thought, to be shared lightly with such a one as Mr.
Bunfit--a thick-headed sort of man, in Gager's opinion, although no doubt
he had by means of industry been successful in some difficult cases.

"'Is lordship ain't stirred," said Bunfit.

"How do you mean--stirred, Mr. Bunfit?"

"Ain't moved nowheres out of London."

"What should he move out of London for? What could he get by cutting?
There ain't nothing so bad when anything's up against one as letting on
that one wants to bolt. He knows all that. He'll stand his ground. He
won't bolt."

"I don't suppose as he will, Gager. It's a rum go, ain't it? the rummiest
as I ever see." This remark had been made so often by Mr. Bunfit, that
Gager had become almost weary of hearing it.

"Oh--rum; rum be b----. What's the use of all that? From what the governor
told me this morning, there isn't a shadow of doubt where the diamonds
are."

"In Paris, of course," said Bunfit.

"They never went to Paris. They were taken from here to Hamburg in a
commercial man's kit--a fellow as travels in knives and scissors. Then
they was recut. They say the cutting was the quickest bit of work ever
done by one man in Hamburg. And now they're in New York. That's what has
come of the diamonds."

"Benjamin, in course," said Bunfit, in a low whisper, just taking the pipe
from between his lips.

"Well--yes. No doubt it was Benjamin. But how did Benjamin get 'em?"

"Lord George--in course," said Bunfit.

"And how did he get 'em?"

"Well--that's where it is; isn't it?" Then there was a pause, during which
Bunfit continued to smoke. "As sure as your name's Gager, he got 'em at
Carlisle."

"And what took Smiler down to Carlisle?"

"Just to put a face on it," said Bunfit.

"And who cut the door?"

"Billy Cann did," said Bunfit.

"And who forced the box?"

"Them two did," said Bunfit.

"And all to put a face on it?"

"Yes--just that. And an uncommon good face they did put on it between 'em
--the best as I ever see."

"All right," said Gager. "So far, so good. I don't agree with you, Mr.
Bunfit; because the thing, when it was done, wouldn't be worth the money.
Lord love you, what would all that have cost? And what was to prevent the
lady and Lord George together taking the diamonds to Benjamin and getting
their price? It never does to be too clever, Mr. Bunfit. And when that was
all done, why did the lady go and get herself robbed again? No--I don't
say but what you're a clever man, in your way, Mr. Bunfit; but you've not
got a hold of the thing here. Why was Smiler going about like a mad dog--
only that he found himself took in?"

"Maybe he expected something else in the box--more than the necklace--as
was to come to him," suggested Bunfit.

"Gammon."

"I don't see why you say gammon, Gager. It ain't polite."

"It is gammon--running away with ideas like them, just as if you was one
of the public. When they two opened that box at Carlisle, which they did
as certain as you sit there, they believed as the diamonds were there.
They were not there."

"I don't think as they was," said Bunfit.

"Very well; where were they! Just walk up to it, Mr. Bunfit, making your
ground good as you go. They two men cut the door, and took the box and
opened it, and when they'd opened it, they didn't get the swag. Where was
the swag?"

"Lord George," said Bunfit again.

"Very well, Lord George. Like enough. But it comes to this. Benjamin, and
they two men of his, had laid themselves out for the robbery. Now, Mr.
Bunfit, whether Lord George and Benjamin were together in that first
affair, or whether they weren't, I can't see my way just at present, and I
don't know as you can see yours--not saying but what you're as quick as
most men, Mr. Bunfit. If he was--and I rayther think that's about it--then
he and Benjamin must have had a few words, and he must have got the jewels
from the lady over night."

"Of course he did; and Smiler and Billy Cann knew as they weren't there."

"There you are, all back again, Mr. Bunfit, not making your ground good as
you go. Smiler and Cann did their job according to order--and precious
sore hearts they had when they'd got the box open. Those fellows at
Carlisle--just like all the provincials--went to work open mouthed, and
before the party left Carlisle it was known that Lord George was
suspected."

"You can't trust those fellows any way," said Mr. Bunfit.

"Well--what happens next? Lord George, he goes to Benjamin, but he isn't
goin' to take the diamonds with him. He has had words with Benjamin or he
has not. Any ways he isn't goin' to take the necklace with him on that
morning. He hasn't been goin' to keep the diamonds about him, not since
what was up at Carlisle. So he gives the diamonds back to the lady."

"And she had 'em all along?"

"I don't say it was so, but I can see my way upon that hypothesis."

"There was something as she had to conceal, Gager. I've said that all
through. I knew it in a moment when I seed her 'aint."

"She's had a deal to conceal, I don't doubt. Well, there they are--with
her still--and the box is gone, and the people as is bringing the lawsuit,
Mr. Camperdown and the rest of 'em, is off their tack. What's she to do
with 'em?"

"Take 'em to Benjamin," said Bunfit with confidence.

"That's all very well, Mr. Bunfit. But there's a quarrel up already with
Benjamin. Benjamin was to have had 'em before. Benjamin has spent a
goodish bit of money, and has been thrown over rather. I dare say Benjamin
was as bad as Smiler, or worse. No doubt Benjamin let on to Smiler, and
thought as Smiler was too many for him. I dare say there was a few words
between him and Smiler. I wouldn't wonder if Smiler didn't threaten to
punch Benjamin's head--which well he could do it--and if there wasn't a
few playful remarks between 'em about penal servitude for life. You see,
Mr. Bunfit, it couldn't have been pleasant for any of 'em."

"They'd've split," said Bunfit.

"But they didn't, not downright. Well, there we are. The diamonds is with
the lady. Lord George has done it all. Lord George and Lady Eustace--
they're keeping company, no doubt, after their own fashion. He's a-robbing
of her, and she has to do pretty much as she's bid. The diamonds is with
the lady, and Lord George is pretty well afraid to look at 'em. After all
that's being done there isn't much to wonder at in that. Then comes the
second robbery."

"And Lord George planned that too?" asked Bunfit.

"I don't pretend to say I know, but just put it this way, Mr. Bunfit. Of
course the thieves were let in by the woman Crabstick?"

"Not a doubt."

"Of course they was Smiler and Billy Cann?"

"I suppose they was."

"She was always about the lady, a-doing for her in everything. Say she
goes to Benjamin and tells him as how her lady still has the necklace, and
then he puts up the second robbery. Then you'd have it all round."

"And Lord George would have lost 'em? It can't be. Lord George and he are
thick as thieves up to this day."

"Very well. I don't say anything against that. Lord George knows as she
has 'em; indeed he'd given 'em back to her to keep. We've got as far as
that, Mr. Bunfit."

"I think she did 'ave 'em."

"Very well. What does Lord George do then? He can't make money of 'em.
They're too hot for his fingers, and so he finds when he thinks of taking
'em into the market. So he puts Benjamin up to the second robbery."

"Who's drawing it fine, now, Gager; eh?"

"Mr. Bunfit, I'm not saying as I've got the truth beyond this, that
Benjamin and his two men were clean done at Carlisle, that Lord George and
his lady brought the jewels up to town between 'em, and that the party who
didn't get 'em at Carlisle tried their hand again, and did get 'em in
Hertford Street." In all of which the ingenious Gager would have been
right if he could have kept his mind clear from the alluring conviction
that a lord had been the chief of the thieves.

"We shall never make a case of it now," said Bunfit despondently.

"I mean to try it on all the same. There's Smiler about town as bold as
brass, and dressed to the nines. He had the cheek to tell me as he was
going down to the Newmarket Spring to look after a horse he's got a share
in."

"I was talking to Billy only yesterday," added Bunfit. "I've got it on my
mind that they didn't treat Billy quite on the square. He didn't let on
anything about Benjamin; but he told me out plain, as how he was very much
disgusted. 'Mr. Bunfit,' said he, 'there's that roguery about, that a
plain man like me can't touch it. There's them as'd pick my eyes out while
I was sleeping, and then swear it against my very self,' Them were his
words, and I knew as how Benjamin hadn't been on the square with him."

"You didn't let on anything, Mr. Bunfit?"

"Well, I just reminded him as how there was five hundred pounds going a-
begging from Mr. Camperdown."

"And what did he say to that, Mr. Bunfit?"

"Well, he said a good deal. He's a sharp little fellow, is Billy, as has
read a deal. You've heard of 'Umpty Dumpty, Gager? 'Umpty Dumpty was a
hegg."

"All right."

"As had a fall, and was smashed, and there's a little poem about him."

"I know."

"Well; Billy says to me: 'Mr. Camperdown don't want no hinformation; he
wants the diamonds.' Them diamonds is like 'Umpty Dumpty, Mr. Bunfit. All
the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put 'Umpty Dumpty up
again."

"Billy was about right there," said the younger officer, rising from his
seat.

Late on the afternoon of the same day, when London had already been given
over to the gaslights, Mr. Gager, having dressed himself especially for
the occasion of the friendly visit which he intended to make, sauntered
into a small public-house at the corner of Meek Street and Pineapple
Court, which locality, as all men well versed with London are aware, lies
within one minute's walk of the top of Gray's Inn Lane. Gager, during his
conference with his colleague Bunfit, had been dressed in plain black
clothes; but in spite of his plain clothes he looked every inch a
policeman. There was a stiffness about his limbs, and, at the same time, a
sharpness in his eyes, which, in the conjunction with the locality in
which he was placed, declared his profession beyond the possibility of
mistake. Nor, in that locality, would he have desired to be taken for
anything else. But as he entered the "Rising Sun" in Meek Street, there
was nothing of the policeman about him. He might probably have been taken
for a betting man, with whom the world had latterly gone well enough to
enable him to maintain that sleek, easy, greasy appearance which seems to
be the beau ideal of a betting man's personal ambition. "Well, Mr.
Howard," said the lady at the bar, "a sight of you is good for sore eyes."

"Six penn'orth of brandy--warm, if you please, my dear," said the pseudo-
Howard, as he strolled easily into an inner room, with which he seemed to
be quite familiar. He seated himself in an old-fashioned wooden arm-chair,
gazed up at the gas lamp, and stirred his liquor slowly. Occasionally he
raised the glass to his lips, but he did not seem to be at all intent upon
his drinking. When he entered the room, there had been a gentleman and a
lady there, whose festive moments seemed to be disturbed by some slight
disagreement; but Howard, as he gazed at the lamp, paid no attention to
them whatever. They soon left the room, their quarrel and their drink
finished together, and others dropped in and out. Mr. Howard's "warm" must
almost have become cold, so long did he sit there, gazing at the gas lamps
rather than attending to his brandy and water. Not a word did he speak to
any one for more than an hour, and not a sign did he show of impatience.
At last he was alone; but had not been so for above a minute when in
stepped a jaunty little man, certainly not more than five feet high, about
three or four and twenty years of age, dressed with great care, with his
trousers sticking to his legs, with a French chimneypot hat on his head,
very much peaked fore and aft and closely turned up at the sides. He had a
bright-coloured silk-handkerchief round his neck, and a white shirt, of
which the collar and wristbands were rather larger and longer than suited
the small dimensions of the man. He wore a white greatcoat tight buttoned
round his waist, but so arranged as to show the glories of the coloured
handkerchief; and in his hand he carried a diminutive cane with a little
silver knob. He stepped airily into the room, and as he did so he
addressed our friend the policeman with much cordiality.

"My dear Mr. 'Oward," he said, "this is a pleasure. This is a pleasure.
This is a pleasure."

"What is it to be?" asked Gager.

"Well; ay, what? Shall I say a little port wine negus, with the nutmeg in
it rayther strong?" This suggestion he made to a young lady from the bar,
who had followed him into the room. The negus was brought and paid for by
Gager, who then requested that they might be left there undisturbed for
five minutes. The young lady promised to do her best, and then closed the
door. "And now, Mr. 'Oward, what can I do for you?" said Mr. Cann, the
burglar.

Gager, before he answered, took a pipe-case out of his pocket, and lit the
pipe. "Will you smoke, Billy?" said he.

"Well--no, I don't know that I will smoke. A very little tobacco goes a
long way with me, Mr. 'Oward. One cigar before I turn in; that's about the
outside of it. You see, Mr. 'Oward, pleasures should never be made
necessities, when the circumstances of a gentleman's life may perhaps
require that they shall be abandoned for prolonged periods. In your line
of life, Mr. 'Oward, which has its objections, smoking may be pretty well
a certainty." Mr. Cann, as he made these remarks, skipped about the room,
and gave point to his argument by touching Mr. Howard's waistcoat with the
end of his cane.

"And now, Billy, how about the young woman?"

"I haven't set eyes on her these six weeks, Mr. 'Oward. I never see her
but once in my life, Mr. 'Oward; or, maybe, twice, for one's memory is
deceitful; and I don't know that I ever wish to see her again. She ain't
one of my sort, Mr. 'Oward. I likes 'em soft, and sweet, and coming. This
one, she has her good p'ints about her, as clean a foot and ankle as I'd
wish to see; but, laws, what a nose, Mr. 'Oward. And then for manner;
she's no more manner than a stable dog."

"She's in London, Billy?"

"How am I to know, Mr. 'Oward?"

"What's the good, then, of your coming here?" asked Gager, with no little
severity in his voice.

"I don't know as it is good. I 'aven't said nothing about any good, Mr.
'Oward. What you wants to find is them diamonds?"

"Of course I do."

"Well; you won't find 'em. I knows nothing about 'em, in course, except
just what I'm told. You know my line of life, Mr. 'Oward?"

"Not a doubt about it."

"And I know yours. I'm in the way of hearing about these things, and for
the matter of that, so are you too. It may be, my ears are the longer. I
'ave 'eard. You don't expect me to tell you more than just that. I 'ave
'eard. It was a pretty thing, wasn't it? But I wasn't in it myself, more's
the pity. You can't expect fairer than that, Mr. 'Oward?"

"And what have you heard?"

"Them diamonds is gone where none of you can get at 'em. That five hundred
pounds as the lawyers 'ave offered is just nowhere. If you want
information, Mr. 'Oward, you should say information."

"And you could give it; eh, Billy?"

"No--no--" He uttered these two negatives in a low voice, and with much
deliberation. "I couldn't give it. A man can't give what he hasn't got;
but perhaps I could get it."

"What an ass you are, Billy. Don't you know that I know all about it?"

"What an ass you are, Mr. 'Oward. Don't I know that you don't know; or you
wouldn't come to me. You guess. You're always a-guessing. But guessing
ain't knowing. You don't know; nor yet don't I. What is it to be, if I
find out where that young woman is?"

"A tenner, Billy."

"Five quid now, and five when you've seen her?"

"All right, Billy."

"She's a-going to be married to Smiler next Sunday as ever is down at
Ramsgate; and at Ramsgate she is now. You'll find her, Mr. 'Oward, if
you'll keep your eyes open, somewhere about the 'Fiddle with One String.'
"

This information was so far recognised by Mr. Howard as correct, that he
paid Mr. Cann five sovereigns down for it at once.




CHAPTER LVIII

THE "FIDDLE WITH ONE STRING"


Mr. Gager reached Ramsgate by the earliest train on the following morning,
and was not long in finding out the "Fiddle with One String." The "Fiddle
with One String" was a public-house, very humble in appearance, in the
outskirts of the town, on the road leading to Pegwell Bay. On this
occasion Mr. Gager was dressed in his ordinary plain clothes, and though
the policeman's calling might not be so manifestly declared by his
appearance at Ramsgate as it was in Scotland Yard, still, let a hint in
that direction have ever been given, and the ordinary citizens of Ramsgate
would at once be convinced that the man was what he was. Gager had
doubtless considered all the circumstances of his day's work carefully,
and had determined that success would more probably attend him with this
than with any other line of action. He walked at once into the house, and
asked whether a young woman was not lodging there. The man of the house
was behind the bar, with his wife, and to him Gager whispered a few words.
The man stood dumb for a moment, and then his wife spoke. "What's up now?"
said she, "There's no young women here. We don't have no young women."
Then the man whispered a word to his wife, during which Gager stood among
the customers before the bar with an easy, unembarrassed air.

"Well, what's the odds?" said the wife. "There ain't anything wrong with
us."

"Never thought there was, ma'am," said Gager. "And there's nothing wrong
as I know of with the young woman." Then the husband and wife consulted
together, and Mr. Gager was asked to take a seat in a little parlour,
while the woman ran upstairs for half an instant. Gager looked about him
quickly, and took in at a glance the system of the construction of the
"Fiddle with One String." He did sit down in the little parlour, with the
door open, and remained there for perhaps a couple of minutes. Then he
went to the front door, and glanced up at the roof.

"It's all right," said the keeper of the house, following him. "She ain't
a-going to get away. She ain't just very well, and she's a-lying down."

"You tell her, with my regards," said Gager, "that she needn't be a bit
the worse because of me." The man looked at him suspiciously. "You tell
her what I say. And tell her, too, the quicker the better. She has a
gentleman a-looking after her, I daresay. Perhaps I'd better be off before
he comes." The message was taken up to the lady, and Gager again seated
himself in the little parlour.

We are often told that all is fair in love and war, and perhaps the
operation on which Mr. Gager was now intent may be regarded as warlike.
But he now took advantage of a certain softness in the character of the
lady whom he wished to meet, which hardly seems to be justifiable even in
a policeman. When Lizzie's tall footman had been in trouble about the
necklace, a photograph had been taken from him which had not been restored
to him. This was a portrait of Patience Crabstick, which she, poor girl,
in a tender moment, had given to him who, had not things gone roughly with
them, was to have been her lover. The little picture had fallen into
Gager's hands, and he now pulled it from his pocket. He himself had never
visited the house in Hertford Street till after the second robbery, and,
in the flesh, had not as yet seen Miss Crabstick; but he had studied her
face carefully, expecting, or at any rate hoping, that he might some day
enjoy the pleasure of personal acquaintance. That pleasure was now about
to come to him, and he prepared himself for it by making himself intimate
with the lines of the lady's face as the sun had portrayed them. There was
even yet some delay, and Mr. Gager more than once testified uneasiness.

"She ain't a-going to get away," said the mistress of the house, "but a
lady as is going to see a gentleman can't jump into her things as a man
does." Gager intimated his acquiescence in all this, and again waited.

"The sooner she comes, the less trouble for her," said Gager to the woman.
"If you'll only make her believe that." At last, when he had been somewhat
over an hour in the house, he was asked to walk upstairs, and then, in a
little sitting-room over the bar, he had the opportunity, so much desired,
of making personal acquaintance with Patience Crabstick.

It may be imagined that the poor waiting-woman had not been in a happy
state of mind since she had been told that a gentleman was waiting to see
her down-stairs, who had declared himself to be a policeman immediately on
entering the shop. To escape was of course her first idea, but she was
soon made to understand that this was impracticable. In the first place
there was but one staircase, at the bottom of which was the open door of
the room in which the policeman was sitting; and then, the woman of the
house was very firm in declaring that she would connive at nothing which
might cost her and her husband their license. "You got to face it," said
the woman.

"I suppose they can't make me get out of bed unless I pleases," said
Patience firmly. But she knew that even that resource would fail her, and
that a policeman, when aggravated, can take upon him all the duties of a
lady's maid. She had to face it, and she did face it.

"I've just got to have a few words with you, my dear," said Gager.

"I suppose, then, we'd better be alone," said Patience; whereupon the
woman of the house discreetly left the room.

The interview was so long that the reader would be fatigued were he asked
to study a record of all that was said on the occasion. The gentleman and
lady were closeted together for more than an hour, and so amicably was the
conversation carried on that when the time was half over Gager stepped
down-stairs and interested himself in procuring Miss Crabstick's
breakfast. He even condescended himself to pick a few shrimps and drink a
glass of beer in her company. A great deal was said and something was even
settled, as may be learned from a few concluding words of that very
memorable conversation. "Just don't you say anything about it, my dear,
but leave word for him that you've gone up to town on business."

"Lord love you, Mr. Gager, he'll know all about it."

"Let him know. Of course he'll know if he comes down. It's my belief he'll
never show himself at Ramsgate again."

"But, Mr. Gager----"

"Well, my dear."

"You aren't a perjuring of yourself?"

"What; about making you my wife? That I ain't. I'm upright and always was.
There's no mistake about me when you've got my word. As soon as this work
is off my mind you shall be Mrs. Gager, my dear. And you'll be all right.
You've been took in, that's what you have."

"That I have, Mr. Gager," said Patience, wiping her eyes.

"You've been took in and you must be forgiven."

"I didn't get--not nothing out of the necklace; and as fot the other
things, they've frightened me so that I let 'em all go for just what I
tell you. And as for Mr. Smiler, I never didn't care for him; that I
didn't. He ain't the man to touch my heart; not at all; and it was not
likely either. A plain fellow, very, Mr. Gager."

"He'll be plainer before long, my dear."

"But I've been that worrited among 'em, Mr. Gager, since first they made
their wicked prepositions, that I've been jest--I don't know how I've
been. And though my lady was not a lady as any girl could like, and did
deserve to have her things took if anybody's things ever should be took,
still, Mr. Gager, I knows I did wrong. I do know it and I'm a-repenting of
it in sackcloth and ashes; so I am. But you'll be as good as your word,
Mr. Gager?"

It must be acknowledged that Mr. Gager had bidden high for success, and
had allowed himself to be carried away by his zeal almost to the verge of
imprudence. It was essential to him that he should take Patience Crabstick
back with him to London, and that he should take her as witness and not as
a criminal. Mr. Benjamin was the game at which he was flying--Mr.
Benjamin, and if possible, Lord George--and he conceived that his net
might be big enough to hold Smiler as well as the other two greater
fishes, if he could induce Patience Crabstick and Billy Cann to co-operate
with him cordially in his fishing.

But his mind was still disturbed on one point. Let him press his beloved
Patience as closely as he might with questions, there was one point on
which he could not get from her what he believed to be the truth. She
persisted that Lord George de Bruce Carruthers had had no hand in either
robbery, and Gager had so firmly committed himself to a belief on this
matter, that he could not throw the idea away from him, even on the
testimony of Patience Crabstick.

On that evening he returned triumphant to Scotland Yard with Patience
Crabstick under his wing; and that lady was housed there with every
comfort she could desire, except that of personal liberty.




CHAPTER LIX

MR. GOWRAN UP IN LONDON


In the mean time Mrs. Hittaway was diligently spreading a report that
Lizzie Eustace either was engaged to marry her cousin Frank, or ought to
be so engaged. This she did, no doubt, with the sole object of saving her
brother; but she did it with a zeal that dealt as freely with Frank's name
as with Lizzie's. They, with all their friends, were her enemies, and she
was quite sure that they were, altogether, a wicked degraded set of
people. Of Lord George and Mrs. Carbuncle, of Miss Roanoke and Sir Griffin
Tewett she believed all manner of evil. She had theories of her own about
the jewels, stories--probably of her own manufacture in part, although no
doubt she believed them to be true--as to the manner of living at Portray,
little histories of Lizzie's debts, and the great fact of the scene which
Mr. Gowran had seen with his own eyes. Lizzie Eustace was an abomination
to her, and this abominable woman her brother was again in danger of
marrying! She was very loud in her denunciations, and took care that they
should reach even Lady Linlithgow, so that poor Lucy Morris might know of
what sort was the lover in whom she trusted. Andy Gowran had been sent for
to town, and was on his journey while Mr. Gager was engaged at Ramsgate.
It was at present the great object of Mrs. Hittaway's life to induce her
brother to see Mr. Gowran before he kept his appointment with Lady
Eustace.

Poor Lucy received the wound which was intended for her. The enemy's
weapons had repeatedly struck her, but hitherto they had alighted on the
strong shield of her faith. But let a shield be never so strong, it may at
last be battered out of all form and service. On Lucy's shield there had
been much of such batterings, and the blows which had come from him in
whom she most trusted had not been the lightest. She had not seen him for
months, and his letters were short, unsatisfactory, and rare. She had
declared to herself and to her friend Lady Fawn that no concurrence of
circumstances, no absence, however long, no rumours that might reach her
ears, would make her doubt the man she loved. She was still steadfast in
the same resolution; but in spite of her resolution her heart began to
fail her. She became weary, unhappy, and ill at ease, and though she would
never acknowledge to herself that she doubted, she did doubt.

"So, after all, your Mr. Greystock is to marry my niece, Lizzie
Greystock." This good-natured speech was made one morning to poor Lucy by
her present patroness, Lady Linlithgow.

"I rather think not," said Lucy, plucking up her spirits and smiling as
she spoke.

"Everybody says so. As for Lizzie, she has become quite a heroine. What
with her necklace, and her two robberies, and her hunting, and her various
lovers--two lords and a member of Parliament, my dear--there is nothing to
equal her. Lady Glencora Palliser has been calling on her. She took care
to let me know that. And I'm told that she certainly is engaged to her
cousin."

"According to your own showing, Lady Linlithgow, she has got two other
lovers. Couldn't you oblige me by letting her marry one of the lords?"

"I'm afraid, my dear, that Mr. Greystock is to be the chosen one." Then
after a pause the old woman became serious. "What is the use, Miss Morris,
of not looking the truth in the face? Mr. Greystock is neglecting you."

"He is not neglecting me. You won't let him come to see me."

"Certainly not; but if he were not neglecting you, you would not be here.
And there he is with Lizzie Eustace every day of his life. He can't afford
to marry you, and he can afford to marry her. It's a deal better that you
should look it all in the face and know what it must all come to."

"I shall just wait, and never believe a word till he speaks it."

"You hardly know what men are, my dear."

"Very likely not, Lady Linlithgow. It may be that I shall have to pay dear
for learning. Of course I may be mistaken as well as another, only I don't
believe I am mistaken."

When this little scene took place, only a month remained of the time for
which Lucy's services were engaged to Lady Linlithgow, and no definite
arrangement had been made as to her future residence. Lady Fawn was
prepared to give her a home, and to Lady Fawn, as it seemed, she must go.
Lady Linlithgow had declared herself unwilling to continue the existing
arrangement because, as she said, it did not suit her that her companion
should be engaged to marry her late sister's nephew. Not a word had been
said about the deanery for the last month or two, and Lucy, though her
hopes in that direction had once been good, was far too high spirited to
make any suggestion herself as to her reception by her lover's family. In
the ordinary course of things she would have to look out for another
situation, like any other governess in want of a place; but she could do
this only by consulting Lady Fawn; and Lady Fawn when consulted would
always settle the whole matter by simply bidding her young friend to come
to Fawn Court.

There must be some end of her living at Fawn Court. So much Lucy told
herself over and over again. It could be but a temporary measure. If--if
it was to be her fate to be taken away from Fawn Court a happy, glorious,
triumphant bride, then the additional obligation put upon her by her dear
friends would not be more than she could bear. But to go to Fawn Court,
and, by degrees, to have it acknowledged that another place must be found
for her, would be very bad. She would infinitely prefer any intermediate
hardship. How, then, should she know? As soon as she was able to escape
from the countess, she went up to her own room, and wrote the following
letter. She studied the words with great care as she wrote them--sitting
and thinking before she allowed her pen to run on the paper.

"MY DEAR FRANK: It is a long time since we met--is it not? I do not write
this as a reproach, but because my friends tell me that I should not
continue to think myself engaged to you. They say that, situated as you
are, you cannot afford to marry a penniless girl, and that I ought not to
wish you to sacrifice yourself. I do understand enough of your affairs to
know that an imprudent marriage may ruin you, and I certainly do not wish
to be the cause of injury to you. All I ask is that you should tell me the
truth. It is not that I am impatient; but that I must decide what to do
with myself when I leave Lady Linlithgow. Your most affectionate friend,

"LUCY MORRIS.

"March 2, 18--."

She read this letter over and over again, thinking of all that it said and
of all that it omitted to say. She was at first half disposed to make
protestations of forgiveness, to assure him that not even within her own
heart would she reproach him, should he feel himself bound to retract the
promise he had made her. She longed to break out into love, but so to
express her love that her lover should know that it was strong enough even
to sacrifice itself for his sake. But though her heart longed to speak
freely, her judgment told her that it would be better that she should be
reticent and tranquil in her language. Any warmth on her part would be in
itself a reproach to him. If she really wished to assist him in
extricating himself from a difficulty into which he had fallen in her
behalf, she would best do so by offering him his freedom in the fewest and
plainest words which she could select.

But even when the letter was written she doubted as to the wisdom of
sending it. She kept it that she might sleep upon it. She did sleep upon
it, and when the morning came she would not send it. Had not absolute
faith in her lover been the rock on which she had declared to herself that
she would build the house of her future hopes? Had not she protested again
and again that no caution from others should induce her to waver in her
belief? Was it not her great doctrine to trust, to trust implicitly, even
though all should be lost if her trust should be misplaced? And was it
well that she should depart from all this, merely because it might be
convenient for her to make arrangements as to the coming months? If it
were to be her fate to be rejected, thrown over, and deceived, of what use
to her could be any future arrangements? All to her would be ruin, and it
would matter to her nothing whither she should be taken. And then, why
should she lie to him as she would lie in sending such a letter? If he did
throw her over he would be a traitor, and her heart would be full of
reproaches. Whatever might be his future lot in life, he owed it to her to
share it with her, and if he evaded his debt he would be a traitor and a
miscreant. She would never tell him so. She would be far too proud to
condescend to spoken or written reproaches. But she would know that it
would be so, and why should she lie to him by saying that it would not be
so? Thinking of all this, when the morning came, she left the letter lying
within her desk.

Lord Fawn was to call upon Lady Eustace on the Saturday, and on Friday
afternoon Mr. Andrew Gowran was in Mrs. Hittaway's back parlour in Warwick
Square. After many efforts, and with much persuasion, the brother had
agreed to see his sister's great witness. Lord Fawn had felt that he would
lower himself by any intercourse with such a one as Andy Gowran in regard
to the conduct of the woman whom he had proposed to make his wife, and had
endeavoured to avoid the meeting. He had been angry, piteous, haughty, and
sullen by turns; but Mrs. Hittaway had overcome him by dogged
perseverance; and poor Lord Fawn had at last consented. He was to come to
Warwick Square as soon as the House was up on Friday evening, and dine
there. Before dinner he was to be introduced to Mr. Gowran. Andy arrived
at the house at half-past five, and after some conversation with Mrs.
Hittaway, was left there all alone to await the coming of Lord Fawn. He
was in appearance and manners very different from the Andy Gowran
familiarly known among the braes and crofts of Portray. He had a heavy
stiff hat, which he carried in his hand. He wore a black swallow-tail coat
and black trousers, and a heavy red waistcoat buttoned up nearly to his
throat, round which was lightly tied a dingy black silk handkerchief. At
Portray no man was more voluble, no man more self-confident, no man more
equal to his daily occupations than Andy Gowran; but the unaccustomed
clothes, and the journey to London, and the town houses overcame him, and
for a while almost silenced him. Mrs. Hittaway found him silent, cautious,
and timid. Not knowing what to do with him, fearing to ask him to go and
eat in the kitchen, and not liking to have meat and unlimited drink
brought for him into the parlour, she directed the servant to supply him
with a glass of sherry and a couple of biscuits. He had come an hour
before the time named, and there, with nothing to cheer him beyond these
slight creature comforts, he was left to wait all alone till Lord Fawn
should be ready to see him.

Andy had seen lords before. Lords are not rarer in Ayrshire than in other
Scotch counties; and then, had not Lord George de Bruce Carruthers been
staying at Portray half the winter? But Lord George was not to Andy a real
lord, and then a lord down in his own county was so much less to him than
a lord up in London. And this lord was a lord of Parliament, and a
government lord, and might probably have the power of hanging such a one
as Andy Gowran were he to commit perjury, or say anything which the lord
might choose to call perjury. What it was that Lord Fawn wished him to
say, he could not make himself sure. That the lord's sister wished him to
prove Lady Eustace to be all that was bad, he knew very well. But he
thought that he was able to perceive that the brother and sister were not
at one, and more than once during his journey up to London he had almost
made up his mind that he would turn tail and go back to Portray. No doubt
there was enmity between him and his mistress; but then his mistress did
not attempt to hurt him even though he had insulted her grossly; and were
she to tell him to leave her service, it would be from Mr. John Eustace,
and not from Mrs. Hittaway, that he must look for the continuation of his
employment. Nevertheless he had taken Mrs. Hittaway's money and there he
was.

At half-past seven Lord Fawn was brought into the room by his sister, and
Andy Gowran, rising from his chair, three times ducked his head. "Mr.
Gowran," said Mrs. Hittaway, "my brother is desirous that you should tell
him exactly what you have seen of Lady Eustace's conduct down at Portray.
You may speak quite freely, and I know you will speak truly." Andy again
ducked his head. "Frederic," continued the lady, "I am sure that you may
implicitly believe all that Mr. Gowran will say to you." Then Mrs.
Hittaway left the room, as her brother had expressly stipulated that she
should do.

Lord Fawn was quite at a loss how to begin, and Andy was by no means
prepared to help him. "If I am rightly informed," said the lord, "you have
been for many years employed on the Portray property?"

"A' my life, so please your lairdship."

"Just so; just so. And of course interested in the welfare of the Eustace
family?"

"Nae doobt, my laird, nae doobt; vera interasted indeed."

"And being an honest man, have felt sorrow that the Portray property
should--should--should--that anything bad should happen to it." Andy
nodded his head, and Lord Fawn perceived that he was nowhere near the
beginning of his matter. "Lady Eustace is at present your mistress?"

"Just in a fawshion, my laird, as a mon may say. That is she is, and she
is nae. There's a mony things at Portray as ha' to be lookit after."

"She pays you your wages?" said Lord Fawn shortly.

"Eh--wages! Yes, my laird, she does a' that."

"Then she's your mistress." Andy again nodded his head, and Lord Fawn
again struggled to find some way in which he might approach the subject.
"Her cousin, Mr. Greystock, has been staying at Portray lately?"

"More coothie than coosinly," said Andy, winking his eye.

It was dreadful to Lord Fawn that the man should wink his eye at him. He
did not quite understand what Andy had last said, but he did understand
that some accusation as to indecent familiarity with her cousin was
intended to be brought by this Scotch steward against the woman to whom he
had engaged himself. Every feeling of his nature revolted against the task
before him, and he found that on trial it became absolutely impracticable.
He could not bring himself to inquire minutely as to poor Lizzie's
flirting down among the rocks. He was weak and foolish, and in many
respects ignorant, but he was a gentleman. As he got nearer to the point
which it had been intended that he should reach, the more he hated Andy
Gowran, and the more he hated himself for having submitted to such
contact. He paused a moment and then he declared that the conversation was
at an end. "I think that will do, Mr. Gowran," he said. "I don't know that
you can tell me anything I want to hear. I think you had better go back to
Scotland." So saying, he left Andy alone and stalked up to the drawing-
room. When he entered it both Mr. Hittaway and his sister were there.
"Clara," he said very sternly, "you had better send some one to dismiss
that man. I shall not speak to him again."

Lord Fawn did not speak to Andy Gowran again, but Mrs. Hittaway did. After
a faint and futile endeavour made by her to ascertain what had taken place
in the parlour down-stairs, she descended and found Andy seated in his
chair, still holding his hat in his hand, as stiff as a wax figure. He had
been afraid of the lord, but as soon as the lord had left him he was very
angry with the lord. He had been brought up all that way to tell his story
to the lord, and the lord had gone away without hearing a word of it, had
gone away and had absolutely insulted him, had asked him who paid him his
wages, and had then told him that Lady Eustace was his mistress. Andy
Gowran felt strongly that this was not that kind of confidential usage
which he had had a right to expect. And after his experience of the last
hour and a half, he did not at all relish his renewed solitude in that
room. "A drap of puir thin liquor-poored out too-in a weeny glass nae
deeper than an egg shell, and twa cookies; that's what she ca'ed
rafrashment!" It was thus that Andy afterwards spoke to his wife of the
hospitalities offered to him in Warwick Square, regarding which his anger
was especially hot, in that he had been treated like a child or a common
labourer, instead of having the decanter left with him to be used at his
own discretion. When, therefore, Mrs. Hittaway returned to him, the awe
with which new circumstances and the lord had filled him was fast
vanishing and giving place to that stubborn indignation against people in
general, which was his normal condition. "I suppose I'm jist to gang bock
again to Portray, Mrs. Heetaway, and that'll be a' you'll want o' me?"
This he said the moment the lady entered the room.

But Mrs. Hittaway did not want to lose his services quite so soon. She
expressed regret that her brother should have found himself unable to
discuss a subject that was naturally so very distasteful to him, and
begged Mr. Gowran to come to her again the next morning. "What I saw wi'
my ain twa e'es, Mrs. Heetaway, I saw, and nane the less because his
lairdship may nae find it jist tasteful, as your leddyship was saying.
There were them twa a-colloguing, and a-seetting ilk in ither's laps a'
o'er, and a-keessing--yes, my leddy, a-keessing as females, not to say
males, ought nae to keess unless they be mon and wife--and then not amang
the rocks, my leddy; and if his lairdship does nae care to hear tell o'
it, and finds it nae tasteful, as your leddyship was saying, he should nae
ha' sent for Andy Gowran a' the way from Portray, jist to tell him what he
wanna hear, now I'm come to tell't to him!"

All this was said with so much unction that even Mrs. Hittaway herself
found it to be not "tasteful." She shrunk and shivered under Mr. Gowran's
eloquence, and almost repented of her zeal. But women, perhaps, feel less
repugnance than men do at using ignoble assistance in the achievement of
good purposes. Though Mrs. Hittaway shrunk and shivered under the strong
action with which Mr. Gowran garnished his strong words, still she was
sure of the excellence of her purpose; and believing that useful aid might
still be obtained from Andy Gowran, and perhaps prudently anxious to get
value in return for the cost of the journey up from Ayrshire, she made the
man promise to return to her on the following morning.




CHAPTER LX

LET IT BE AS THOUGH IT HAD NEVER BEEN


Between her son, and her married daughter, and Lucy Morris, poor Lady
Fawn's life had become a burthen to her. Everything was astray, and there
was no happiness or tranquillity at Fawn Court. Of all simply human
creeds, the strongest existing creed for the present in the minds of the
Fawn ladies was that which had reference to the general iniquity of Lizzie
Eustace. She had been the cause of all these sorrows, and she was hated so
much the more because she had not been proved to be iniquitous before all
the world. There had been a time when it seemed to be admitted that she
was so wicked in keeping the diamonds in opposition to the continued
demands made for them by Mr. Camperdown, that all people would be
justified in dropping her, and Lord Fawn among the number. But since the
two robberies public opinion had veered round three or four points in
Lizzie's favour and people were beginning to say that she had been ill-
used. Then had come Mrs. Hittaway's evidence as to Lizzie's wicked doings
down in Scotland--the wicked doings which Andy Gowran had described with a
vehemence so terribly moral--and that which had been at first, as it were,
added to the diamonds, as a supplementary weight thrown into the scale so
that Lizzie's iniquities might bring her absolutely to the ground, had
gradually assumed the position of being the first charge against her. Lady
Fawn had felt no aversion to discussing the diamonds. When Lizzie was
called a "thief," and a "robber," and a "swindler," by one or another of
the ladies of the family--who, in using those strong terms, whispered the
words as ladies are wont to do when they desire to lessen the impropriety
of the strength of their language by the gentleness of the tone in which
the words are spoken--when Lizzie was thus described in Lady Fawn's
hearing in her own house, she had felt no repugnance to it. It was well
that the fact should be known, so that everybody might be aware that her
son was doing right in refusing to marry so wicked a lady. But when the
other thing was added to it; when the story was told of what Mr. Gowran
had seen among the rocks, and when gradually that became the special crime
which was to justify her son in dropping the lady's acquaintance, then
Lady Fawn became very unhappy, and found the subject to be, as Mrs.
Hittaway had described it, very distasteful.

And this trouble hit Lucy Morris as hard as it did Lord Fawn. If Lizzie
Eustace was unfit to marry Lord Fawn because of these things, then was
Frank Greystock not only unfit to marry Lucy, but most unlikely to do so,
whether fit or unfit. For a week or two Lady Fawn had allowed herself to
share Lucy's joy, and to believe that Mr. Greystock would prove himself
true to the girl whose heart he had made all his own; but she had soon
learned to distrust the young member of Parliament who was always behaving
insolently to her son, who spent his holidays down with Lizzie Eustace,
who never visited and rarely wrote to the girl he had promised to marry,
and as to whom all the world agreed in saying that he was far too much in
debt to marry any woman who had not means to help him. It was all sorrow
and vexation together; and yet when her married daughter would press the
subject upon her, and demand her co-operation, she had no power of
escaping.

"Mamma," Mrs. Hittaway had said, "Lady Glencora Palliser has been with
her, and everybody is taking her up, and if her conduct down in Scotland
isn't proved, Frederic will be made to marry her."

"But what can I do, my dear?" Lady Fawn had asked, almost in tears.

"Insist that Frederic shall know the whole truth," replied Mrs. Hittaway
with energy. "Of course it is very disagreeable. Nobody can feel it more
than I do. It is horrible to have to talk about such things, and to think
of them."

"Indeed it is, Clara, very horrible."

"But anything, mamma, is better than that Frederic should be allowed to
marry such a woman as that. It must be proved to him--how unfit she is to
be his wife." With the view of carrying out this intention, Mrs. Hittaway
had, as we have seen, received Andy Gowran at her own house; and with the
same view she took Andy Gowran the following morning down to Richmond.

Mrs. Hittaway, and her mother, and Andy were closeted together for half an
hour, and Lady Fawn suffered grievously. Lord Fawn had found that he
couldn't hear the story, and he had not heard it. He had been strong
enough to escape, and had, upon the whole, got the best of it in the
slight skirmish which had taken place between him and the Scotchman, but
poor old Lady Fawn could not escape. Andy was allowed to be eloquent, and
the whole story was told to her, though she would almost sooner have been
flogged at a cart's tail than have heard it. Then "rafrashments" were
administered to Andy of a nature which made him prefer Fawn Court to
Warwick Square, and he was told that he might go back to Portray as soon
as he pleased.

When he was gone, Mrs. Hittaway opened her mind to her mother altogether.
"The truth is, mamma, that Frederic will marry her."

"But why? I thought that he had declared that he would give it up. I
thought that he had said so to herself."

"What of that, if he retracts what he said? He is so weak. Lady Glencora
Palliser has made him promise to go and see her; and he is to go to-day.
He is there now, probably, at this very moment. If he had been firm, the
thing was done. After all that has taken place, nobody would ever have
supposed that his engagement need go for anything. But what can he say to
her now that he is in with her, except just do the mischief all over
again? I call it quite wicked in that woman's interfering. I do, indeed!
She's a nasty, insolent, impertinent creature; that's what she is. After
all the trouble I've taken, she comes and undoes it all with one word."

"What can we do, Clara?"

"Well; I do believe that if Frederic could be made to act as he ought to
do, just for a while, she would marry her cousin, Mr. Greystock, and then
there would be an end of it altogether. I really think that she likes him
best, and from all that I can hear she would take him now, if Frederic
would only keep out of the way. As for him, of course he is doing his very
best to get her. He has not one shilling to rub against another, and is
over head and ears in debt."

"Poor Lucy!" ejaculated Lady Fawn.

"Well, yes; but really that is a matter of course. I always thought,
mamma, that you and Amelia were a little wrong to coax her up in that
belief."

"But, my dear, the man proposed for her in the plainest possible manner. I
saw his letter."

"No doubt; men do propose. We all know that. I'm sure I don't know what
they get by it, but I suppose it amuses them. There used to be a sort of
feeling that if a man behaved badly something would be done to him; but
that's all over now. A man may propose to whom he likes, and if he chooses
to say afterwards that it doesn't mean anything, there's nothing in the
world to bring him to book."

"That's very hard," said the elder lady, of whom everybody said that she
did not understand the world as well as her daughter.

"The girls--they all know that it is so, and I suppose it comes to the
same thing in the long run. The men have to marry, and what one girl loses
another girl gets."

"It will kill Lucy."

"Girls ain't killed so easy, mamma--not now-a-days. Saying that it will
kill her won't change the man's nature. It wasn't to be expected that such
a man as Frank Greystock, in debt, and in Parliament, and going to all the
best houses, should marry your governess. What was he to get by it? That's
what I want to know."

"I suppose he loved her."

"Laws, mamma, how antediluvian you are! No doubt he did like her--after
his fashion; though what he saw in her, I never could tell. I think Miss
Morris would make a very nice wife for a country clergyman who didn't care
how poor things were. But she has no style; and as far as I can see she
has no beauty. Why should such a man as Frank Greystock tie himself by the
leg for ever to such a girl as that? But, mamma, he doesn't mean to marry
Lucy Morris. Would he have been going on in that way with his cousin down
in Scotland had he meant it? He means nothing of the kind. He means to
marry Lady Eustace's income if he can get it; and she would marry him
before the summer, if only we could keep Frederic away from her."

Mrs. Hittaway demanded from her mother that in season and out of season
she should be urgent with Lord Fawn, impressing upon him the necessity of
waiting, in order that he might see how false Lady Eustace was to him; and
also that she should teach Lucy Morris how vain were all her hopes. If
Lucy Morris would withdraw her claims altogether the thing might probably
be more quickly and more surely managed. If Lucy could be induced to tell
Frank that she withdrew her claim, and that she saw how impossible it was
that they should ever be man and wife, then--so argued Mrs. Hittaway--
Frank would at once throw himself at his cousin's feet, and all the
difficulty would be over. The abominable, unjustifiable, and insolent
interference of Lady Glencora just at the present moment would be the
means of undoing all the good that had been done, unless it could be
neutralised by some such activity as this. The necklace had absolutely
faded away into nothing. The sly creature was almost becoming a heroine on
the strength of the necklace. The very mystery with which the robberies
were pervaded was acting in her favour. Lord Fawn would absolutely be made
to marry her--forced into it by Lady Glencora and that set--unless the
love affair between her and her cousin, of which Andy Gowran was able to
give such sufficient testimony, could in some way be made available to
prevent it.

The theory of life and system on which social matters should be managed,
as displayed by her married daughter, was very painful to poor old Lady
Fawn. When she was told that under the new order of things promises from
gentlemen were not to be looked upon as binding, that love was to go for
nothing, that girls were to be made contented by being told that when one
lover was lost another could be found, she was very unhappy. She could not
disbelieve it all, and throw herself back upon her faith in virtue,
constancy, and honesty. She rather thought that things had changed for the
worse since she was young, and that promises were not now as binding as
they used to be. She herself had married into a Liberal family, had a
Liberal son, and would have called herself a Liberal; but she could not
fail to hear from others, her neighbours, that the English manners, and
English principles, and English society were all going to destruction in
consequence of the so-called liberality of the age. Gentlemen, she
thought, certainly did do things which gentlemen would not have done forty
years ago; and as for ladies--they, doubtless, were changed altogether.
Most assuredly she could not have brought an Andy Gowran to her mother to
tell such tales in their joint presence as this man had told!

Mrs. Hittaway had ridiculed her for saying that poor Lucy would die when
forced to give up her lover. Mrs. Hittaway had spoken of the necessity of
breaking up that engagement without a word of anger against Frank
Greystock. According to Mrs. Hittaway's views Frank Greystock had amused
himself in the most natural way in the world when he asked Lucy to be his
wife. A governess like Lucy had been quite foolish to expect that such a
man as Greystock was in earnest. Of course she must give up her lover; and
if there must be blame she, must blame herself for her folly!
Nevertheless, Lady Fawn was so soft-hearted that she believed that the
sorrow would crush Lucy, even if it did not kill her.

But not the less was it her duty to tell Lucy what she thought to be the
truth. The story of what had occurred among the rocks at Portray was very
disagreeable, but she believed it to be true. The man had been making love
to his cousin after his engagement to Lucy. And then, was it not quite
manifest that he was neglecting poor Lucy in every way? He had not seen
her for nearly six months. Had he intended to marry her, would he not have
found a home for her at the deanery? Did he in any respect treat her as he
would treat the girl whom he intended to marry? Putting all these things
together, Lady Fawn thought that she saw that Lucy's case was hopeless;
and, so thinking, wrote to her the following letter:

"FAWN COURT, 3d March, 18--

"DEAREST LUCY: I have so much to say to you that I did think of getting
Lady Linlithgow to let you come to us here for a day, but I believe it
will perhaps be better that I should write. I think you leave Lady
Linlithgow after the first week in April, and it is quite necessary that
you should come to some fixed arrangement as to the future. If that were
all, there need not be any trouble, as you will come here, of course.
Indeed, this is your natural home, as we all feel; and I must say that we
have missed you most terribly since you went, not only for Cecilia and
Nina, but for all of us. And I don't know that I should write at all if it
wasn't for something else, that must be said sooner or later; because, as
to your coming here in April, that is so much a matter of course. The only
mistake was, that you should ever have gone away. So we shall expect you
here on whatever day you may arrange with Lady Linlithgow as to leaving
her." (The poor, dear lady went on repeating her affectionate invitation,
because of the difficulty she encountered in finding words with which to
give the cruel counsel which she thought that it was her duty to offer.)

"And now, dearest Lucy, I must say what I believe to be the truth about
Mr. Greystock. I think that you should teach yourself to forget him, or at
any rate, that you should teach yourself to forget the offer which he made
to you last autumn. Whether he was or was not in earnest then, I think
that he has now determined to forget it. I fear there is no doubt that he
has been making love to his cousin, Lady Eustace. You well know that I
should not mention such a thing, if I had not the strongest possible
grounds to convince me that I ought to do so. But, independent of this,
his conduct to you during the last six months has been such as to make us
all feel sure that the engagement is distasteful to him. He has probably
found himself so placed that he cannot marry without money, and has wanted
the firmness, or perhaps you will say the hardness of heart, to say so
openly. I am sure of this, and so is Amelia, that it will be better for
you to give the matter up altogether, and to come here and recover the
blow among friends who will be as kind to you as possible. I know all that
you will feel, and you have my fullest sympathy; but even such sorrows as
that are cured by time, and by the mercy of God, which is not only
infinite, but all-powerful.

"Your most affectionate friend,

"C. FAWN."

Lady Fawn, when she had written her letter, discussed it with Amelia, and
the two together agreed that Lucy would never surmount the ill effects of
the blow which was thus prophesied. "As to saying it will kill her,
mamma," said Amelia, "I don't believe in that. If I were to break my leg,
the accident might shorten my life, and this may shorten hers. It won't
kill her in any other way. But it will alter her altogether. Nobody ever
used to make herself happy so easily as Lucy Morris, but all that will be
gone now."

When Lucy received the letter, the immediate effect upon her, the effect
which came from the first reading of it, was not very great. She succeeded
for some half-hour in putting it aside, as referring to a subject on which
she had quite made up her mind in a direction contrary to that indicated
by her correspondent's advice. Lady Fawn told her that her lover intended
to be false to her. She had thought the matter over very carefully within
the last day or two, and had altogether made up her mind that she would
continue to trust her lover. She had abstained from sending to him the
letter which she had written, and had abstained on that resolution. Lady
Fawn, of course, was as kind and friendly as a friend could be. She loved
Lady Fawn dearly. But she was not bound to think Lady Fawn right, and in
this instance she did not think Lady Fawn right. So she folded up the
letter and put it in her pocket.

But by putting the letter into her pocket she could not put it out of her
mind. Though she had resolved, of what use to her was a resolution in
which she could not trust? Day had passed by after day, week after week,
and month after month, and her very soul within her had become sad for
want of seeing this man, who was living almost in the next street to her.
She was ashamed to own to herself how many hours she had sat at the
window, thinking that, perhaps, he might walk before the house in which he
knew that she was immured. And, even had it been impossible that he should
come to her, the post was open to him. She had scorned to write to him
oftener than he would write to her, and now their correspondence had
dwindled almost to nothing. He knew as well as did Lady Fawn when the
period of her incarceration in Lady Linlithgow's dungeon would come to an
end; and he knew, too, how great had been her hope that she might be
accepted as a guest at the deanery when that period should arrive. He knew
that she must look for a new home, unless he would tell her where she
should live. Was it likely, was it possible, that he should be silent so
long if he still intended to make her his wife? No doubt he had come to
remember his debts, to remember his ambition, to think of his cousin's
wealth, and to think also of his cousin's beauty. What right had she ever
had to hope for such a position as that of his wife, she who had neither
money nor beauty, she who had nothing to give him in return for his name
and the shelter of his house beyond her mind and her heart? As she thought
of it all, she looked down upon her faded gray frock, and stood up that
she might glance at her features in the glass; and she saw how small she
was and insignificant, and reminded herself that all she had in the world
was a few pounds which she had saved and was still saving in order that
she might go to him with decent clothes upon her back. Was it reasonable
that she should expect it?

But why had he come to her and made her thus wretched? She could
acknowledge to herself that she had been foolish, vain, utterly ignorant
of her own value in venturing to hope; perhaps unmaidenly in allowing it
to be seen that she had hoped; but what was he in having first exalted her
before all her friends, and then abasing her so terribly and bringing her
to such utter shipwreck? From spoken or written reproaches she could of
course abstain. She would neither write or speak any; but from unuttered
reproaches how could she abstain? She had called him a traitor once in
playful, loving irony, during those few hours in which her love had been
to her a luxury that she could enjoy. But now he was a traitor indeed. Had
he left her alone she would have loved him in silence, and not have been
wretched in her love. She would, she knew, in that case, have had vigour
enough and sufficient strength of character to bear her burden without
outward signs of suffering, without any inward suffering that would have
disturbed the current of her life. But now everything was over with her.
She had no thought of dying, but her future life was a blank to her.

She came down-stairs to sit at lunch with Lady Linlithgow, and the old
woman did not perceive that anything was amiss with her companion. Further
news had been heard of Lizzie Eustace, and of Lord Fawn, and of the
robberies, and the countess declared how she had read in the newspapers
that one man was already in custody for the burglary at the house in
Hertford Street. From that subject she went on to tidings which had
reached her from her old friend Lady Clantantram that the Fawn marriage
was on again. "Not that I believe it, my dear; because I think that Mr.
Greystock has made it quite safe in that quarter." All this Lucy heard,
and never showed by a single sign, or by a motion of a muscle, that she
was in pain. Then Lady Linlithgow asked her what she meant to do after the
5th of April. "I don't see at all why you shouldn't stay here, if you like
it, Miss Morris; that is, if you have abandoned the stupid idea of an
engagement with Frank Greystock." Lucy smiled, and even thanked the
countess, and said that she had made up her mind to go back to Richmond
for a month or two, till she could get another engagement as a governess.
Then she returned to her room and sat again at her window, looking out
upon the street.

What did it matter now where she went? And yet she must go somewhere, and
do something. There remained to her the wearisome possession of herself,
and while she lived she must eat, and have clothes, and require shelter.
She could not dawdle out a bitter existence under Lady Fawn's roof, eating
the bread of charity, hanging about the rooms and shrubberies useless and
idle. How bitter to her was that possession of herself, as she felt that
there was nothing good to be done with the thing so possessed! She doubted
even whether ever again she could become serviceable as a governess, and
whether the energy would be left to her of earning her bread by teaching
adequately the few things that she knew. But she must make the attempt,
and must go on making it, till God in his mercy should take her to
himself.

And yet but a few months since life had been so sweet to her! As she felt
this she was not thinking of those short days of excited feverish bliss,
in which she had believed that all the good things of the world were to be
showered into her lap; but of previous years in which everything had been
with her as it was now--with the one exception that she had not then been
deceived. She had been full of smiles, and humour, and mirth, absolutely
happy among her friends, though conscious of the necessity of earning her
bread by the exercise of a most precarious profession, while elated by no
hope. Though she had loved the man and had been hopeless, she was happy.
But now, surely, of all maidens, and of all women, she was the most
forlorn.

Having once acceded to the truth of Lady Fawn's views, she abandoned all
hope. Everybody said so, and it was so. There was no word from any side to
encourage her. The thing was done and over, and she would never mention
his name again. She would simply beg of all the Fawns that no allusion
might be made to him in her presence. She would never blame him, and
certainly she would never praise him. As far as she could rule her tongue,
she would never have his name upon her lips again.

She thought for a time that she would send the letter which she had
already written. Any other letter she could not bring herself to write.
Even to think of him was an agony to her; but to communicate her thoughts
to him was worse than agony. It would be almost madness. What need was
there for any letter? If the thing was done it was done. Perhaps there
remained with her, staying by her without her own knowledge, some faint
spark of hope, that even yet he might return to her. At last she resolved
that there should be no letter, and she destroyed that which she had
written.

But she did write a note to Lady Fawn, in which she gratefully accepted
her old friend's kindness till such time as she could "find a place." "As
to that other subject," she said, "I know that you are right. Please let
it all be as though it had never been."




CHAPTER LXI

LIZZIE'S GREAT FRIEND


The Saturday morning came at last for which Lord Fawn had made his
appointment with Lizzie, and a very important day it was in Hertford
Street, chiefly on account of his lordship's visit, but also in respect to
other events which crowded themselves into the day. In the telling of our
tale we have gone a little in advance of this, as it was not till the
subsequent Monday that Lady Linlithgow read in the newspaper, and told
Lucy, how a man had been arrested on account of the robbery. Early on the
Saturday morning Sir Griffin Tewett was in Hertford Street, and, as Lizzie
afterwards understood, there was a terrible scene between both him and
Lucinda and him and Mrs. Carbuncle. She saw nothing of it herself, but
Mrs. Carbuncle brought her the tidings. For the last few days Mrs.
Carbuncle had been very affectionate in her manner to Lizzie, thereby
showing a great change; for nearly the whole of February the lady, who in
fact owned the house, had hardly been courteous to her remunerative guest,
expressing more than once a hint that the arrangement which had brought
them together had better come to an end. "You see, Lady Eustace," Mrs.
Carbuncle had once said, "the trouble about these robberies is almost too
much for me." Lizzie, who was ill at the time, and still trembling with
constant fear on account of the lost diamonds, had taken advantage of her
sick condition, and declined to argue the question of her removal. Now she
was supposed to be convalescent, but Mrs. Carbuncle had returned to her
former ways of affection. No doubt there was cause for this--cause that
was patent to Lizzie herself. Lady Glencora Palliser had called, which
thing alone was felt by Lizzie to alter her position altogether. And then,
though her diamonds were gone, and though the thieves who had stolen them
were undoubtedly aware of her secret as to the first robbery, though she
had herself told that secret to Lord George, whom she had not seen since
she had done so, in spite of all these causes for trouble, she had of late
gradually found herself to be emerging from the state of despondency into
which she had fallen while the diamonds were in her own custody. She knew
that she was regaining her ascendancy; and therefore when Mrs. Carbuncle
came to tell her of the grievous things which had been said down-stairs
between Sir Griffin and his mistress, and to consult her as to the future,
Lizzie was not surprised.

"I suppose the meaning of it is that the match must be off," said Lizzie.

"Oh, dear, no; pray don't say anything so horrid after all that I have
gone through. Don't suggest anything of that kind to Lucinda."

"But surely after what you've told me now, he'll never come here again."

"Oh yes, he will. There's no danger about his coming back. It's only a
sort of a way he has."

"A very disagreeable way," said Lizzie.

"No doubt, Lady Eustace. But then you know you can't have it all sweet.
There must be some things disagreeable. As far as I can learn the property
will be all right after a few years, and it is absolutely indispensable
that Lucinda should do something. She has accepted him and she must go on
with it."

"She seems to me to be very unhappy, Mrs. Carbuncle."

"That was always her way. She was never gay and cheery like other girls. I
have never known her once to be what you would call happy."

"She likes hunting."

"Yes, because she can gallop away out of herself. I have done all I can
for her, and she must go on with the marriage now. As for going back, it
is out of the question. The truth is, we couldn't afford it."

"Then you must keep him in a better humour."

"I am not so much afraid about him; but, dear Lady Eustace, we want you to
help us a little."

"How can I help you?"

"You can, certainly. Could you lend me two hundred and fifty pounds just
for six weeks?" Lizzie's face fell and her eyes became very serious in
their aspect. Two hundred and fifty pounds! "You know you would have ample
security. You need not give Lucinda her present till I've paid you, and
that will be forty-five pounds."

"Thirty-five," said Lizzie with angry decision.

"I thought we agreed upon forty-five when we settled about the servants'
liveries; and then you can let the man at the stables know that I am to
pay for the carriage and horses. You wouldn't be out of the money hardly
above a week or so, and it might be the salvation of Lucinda just at
present."

"Why don't you ask Lord George?"

"Ask Lord George! He hasn't got it. It's much more likely that he should
ask me. I don't know what's come to Lord George this last month past. I
did believe that you and he were to come together. I think these two
robberies have upset him altogether. But, dear Lizzie, you can let me have
it, can't you?"

Lizzie did not at all like the idea of lending money, and by no means
appreciated the security now offered to her. It might be very well for her
to tell the man at the stables that Mrs. Carbuncle would pay him her bill,
but how would it be with her if Mrs. Carbuncle did not pay the bill? And
as for her present to Lucinda--which was to have been a present, and
regarded by the future Lady Tewett as a voluntary offering of good will
and affection--she was altogether averse to having, it disposed of in this
fashion. And yet she did not like to make an enemy of Mrs. Carbuncle.

"I never was so poor in my life before, not since I was married," said
Lizzie.

"You can't be poor, dear Lady Eustace."

"They took my money out of my desk, you know--ever so much."

"Forty-three pounds," said Mrs. Carbuncle, who was, of course, well
instructed in all the details of the robbery.

"And I don't suppose you can guess what the autumn cost me at Portray. The
bills are only coming in now, and really they sometimes so frighten me
that I don't know what I shall do. Indeed I haven't got the money to
spare."

"You'll have every penny of it back in six weeks," said Mrs. Carbuncle,
upon whose face a glow of anger was settling down. She quite intended to
make herself very disagreeable to her "dear Lady Eustace" or her "dear
Lizzie" if she did not get what she wanted; and she knew very well how to
do it. It must be owned that Lizzie was afraid of the woman. It was almost
impossible for her not to be afraid of the people with whom she lived.
There were so many things against her; so many sources of fear! "I am
quite sure you won't refuse me such a trifling favour as this," said Mrs.
Carbuncle, with the glow of anger reddening more and more upon her brow.

"I don't think I have so much at the bankers," said Lizzie.

"They'll let you overdraw just as much as you please. If the check comes
back that will be my look out." Lizzie had tried that game before, and
knew that the bankers would allow her to overdraw. "Come, be a good friend
and do it at once," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Perhaps I can manage a hundred and fifty," said Lizzie, trembling. Mrs.
Carbuncle fought hard for the greater sum; but at last consented to take
the less, and the check was written.

"This, of course, won't interfere with Lucinda's present," said Mrs.
Carbuncle, "as we can make all this right by the horse and carriage
account." To this proposition, however, Lady Eustace made no answer.

Soon after lunch, at which meal Miss Roanoke did not show herself, Lady
Glencora Palliser was announced, and sat for about ten minutes in the
drawing-room. She had come, she said, to give the Duke of Omnium's
compliments to Lady Eustace, and to express a wish on the part of the duke
that the lost diamonds might be recovered.

"I doubt," said Lady Glencora, "whether there is any one in England except
professed jewellers who knows so much about diamonds as his grace."

"Or who has so many," said Mrs. Carbuncle, smiling graciously.

"I don't know about that. I suppose there are, family diamonds, though I
have never seen them. But he sympathises with you completely, Lady
Eustace. I suppose there is hardly hope now of recovering them!" Lizzie
smiled and shook her head. "Isn't it odd that they never should have
discovered the thieves? I'm told they haven't at all given it up, only,
unfortunately they'll never get back the necklace." She sat there for
about a quarter of an hour, and then, as she took her leave, she whispered
a few words to Lizzie. "He is to come and see you, isn't he?" Lizzie
assented with a smile, but without a word. "I hope it will be all right,"
said Lady Glencora, and then she went.

Lizzie liked this friendship from Lady Glencora amazingly. Perhaps, after
all, nothing more would ever be known about the diamonds, and they would
simply be remembered as having added a peculiar and not injurious mystery
to her life. Lord George knew, but then she trusted that a benevolent,
true-hearted Corsair, such as was Lord George, would never tell the story
against her. The thieves knew, but surely they, if not detected, would
never tell. And if the story were told by thieves, or even by a Corsair,
at any rate half the world would not believe it. What she had feared--had
feared till the dread had nearly overcome her--was public exposure at the
hands of the police. If she could escape that, the world might stilll be
bright before her. And the interest taken in her by such persons as the
Duke of Omnium and Lady Glencora was evidence not only that she had
escaped it hitherto, but also that she was in a fair way to escape it
altogether. Three weeks ago she would have given up half her income to
have been able to steal out of London without leaving a trace behind her.
Three weeks ago Mrs. Carbuncle was treating her with discourtesy, and she
was left alone nearly the whole day in her sick bedroom. Things were going
better with her now. She was recovering her position. Mr. Camperdown, who
had been the first to attack her, was, so to say, "nowhere." He had
acknowledged himself beaten. Lord Fawn, whose treatment to her had been so
great an injury, was coming to see her that very day. Her cousin Frank,
though he had never offered to marry her, was more affectionate to her
than ever. Mrs. Carbuncle had been at her feet that morning borrowing
money. And Lady Glencora Palliser, the very leading star of fashion, had
called upon her twice! Why should she succumb? She had an income of four
thousand pounds a year, and she thought that she could remember that her
aunt, Lady Linlithgow, had but seven hundred pounds. Lady Fawn with all
her daughters had not near so much as she had. And she was beautiful, too,
and young, and perfectly free to do what she pleased. No doubt the last
eighteen months of her life had been made wretched by those horrid
diamonds; but they were gone, and she had fair reason to hope that the
very knowledge of them was gone also.

In this condition would it be expedient for her to accept Lord Fawn when
he came? She could not, of course, be sure that any renewed offer would be
the result of his visit: but she thought it probable that with care she
might bring him to that. Why should he come to her if he himself had no
such intention? Her mind was quite made up on this point, that he should
be made to renew his offer; but whether she would renew her acceptance was
quite another question. She had sworn to her cousin Frank that she would
never do so, and she had sworn also that she would be revenged on this
wretched lord. Now would be her opportunity of accomplishing her revenge,
and of proving to Frank that she had been in earnest. And she positively
disliked the man. That probably did not go for much, but it went for
something, even with Lizzie Eustace. Her cousin she did like, and Lord
George. She hardly knew which was her real love, though no doubt she gave
the preference greatly to her cousin, because she could trust him. And
then Lord Fawn was very poor. The other two men were poor also; but their
poverty was not so objectionable in Lizzie's eyes as were the respectable,
close-fisted economies of Lord Fawn. Lord Fawn, no doubt, had an assured
income and a real peerage, and could make her a peeress. As she thought of
it all, she acknowledged that there was a great deal to be said on each
side, and that the necessity of making up her mind then and there was a
heavy burthen upon her.

Exactly at the hour named Lord Fawn came, and Lizzie was, of course, found
alone. That had been carefully provided. He was shown up, and she received
him very gracefully. She was sitting, and she rose from her chair, and put
out her hand for him to take. She spoke no word of greeting, but looked at
him with a pleasant smile, and stood for a few seconds with her hand in
his. He was awkward, and much embarrassed, and she certainly had no
intention of lessening his embarrassment. "I hope you are better than you
have been," he said at last.

"I am getting better, Lord Fawn. Will you not sit down?" He then seated
himself, placing his hat beside him on the floor, but at the moment could
not find words to speak. "I have been very ill."

"I have been so sorry to hear it."

"There has been much to make me ill--has there not?"

"About the robbery, you mean?"

"About many things. The robbery has been by no means the worst, though no
doubt it frightened me much. There were two robberies, Lord Fawn."

"Yes, I know that."

"And it was very terrible. And then, I had been threatened with a lawsuit.
You have heard that, too?"

"Yes--I had heard it."

"I believe they have given that up now. I understand from my cousin, Mr.
Greystock, who has been my truest friend in all my troubles, that the
stupid people have found out at last that they had not a leg to stand on.
I dare say you have heard that, Lord Fawn?"

Lord Fawn certainly had heard, in a doubtful way, the gist of Mr. Dove's
opinion, namely, that the necklace could not be claimed from the holder of
it as an heirloom attached to the Eustace family. But he had heard at the
same time that Mr. Camperdown was as confident as ever that he could
recover the property by claiming it after another fashion. Whether or no
that claim had been altogether abandoned, or had been allowed to fall into
abeyance because of the absence of the diamonds, he did not know, nor did
any one know--Mr. Camperdown himself having come to no decision on the
subject. But Lord Fawn had been aware that his sister had of late shifted
the ground of her inveterate enmity to Lizzie Eustace, making use of the
scene which Mr. Gowran had witnessed, in lieu of the lady's rapacity in
regard to the necklace. It might therefore be assumed, Lord Fawn thought
and feared, that his strong ground in regard to the necklace had been cut
from under his feet. But still, it did not behoove him to confess that the
cause which he had always alleged as the ground for his retreat from the
engagement was no cause at all. It might go hard with him should an
attempt be made to force him to name another cause. He knew that he would
lack the courage to tell the lady that he had heard from his sister that
one Andy Gowran had witnessed a terrible scene down among the rocks at
Portray. So he sat silent, and made no answer to Lizzie's first assertion
respecting the diamonds.

But the necklace was her strong point, and she did not intend that he
should escape the subject. "If I remember right, Lord Fawn, you yourself
saw that wretched old attorney once or twice on the subject?"

"I did see Mr. Camperdown, certainly. He is my own family lawyer."

"You were kind enough to interest yourself about the diamonds--were you
not?" She asked him this as a question, and then waited for a reply. "Was
it not so?"

"Yes, Lady Eustace; it was so."

"They were of great value, and it was natural," continued "Lizzie. "Of
course you interested yourself. Mr. Camperdown was full of awful threats
against me--was he not? I don't know what he was not going to do. He
stopped me in the street as I was driving to the station in my own
carriage, when the diamonds were with me; which was a very strong measure,
I think. And he wrote me ever so many, oh, such horrid letters. And he
went about telling everybody that it was an heirloom--didn't he? You know
all that, Lord Fawn?"

"I know that he wanted to recover them."

"And did he tell you that he went to a real lawyer, somebody who really
knew about it, Mr. Turbot, or Turtle, or some such name as that, and the
real lawyer told him that he was all wrong, and that the necklace couldn't
be an heirloom at all, because it belonged to me, and that he had better
drop his lawsuit altogether? Did you hear that?"

"No; I did not hear that."

"Ah, Lord Fawn, you dropped your inquiries just at the wrong place. No
doubt you had too many things to do in Parliament and the Government to go
on with them; but if you had gone on, you would have learned that Mr.
Camperdown had just to give it up, because he had been wrong from
beginning to end." Lizzie's words fell from her with extreme rapidity, and
she had become almost out of breath from the effects of her own energy.

Lord Fawn felt strongly the necessity of clinging to the diamonds as his
one great and sufficient justification. "I thought," said he, "that Mr.
Camperdown had abandoned his action for the present because the jewels had
been stolen."

"Not a bit of it," said Lizzie, rising suddenly to her legs. "Who says so?
Who dares to say so? Whoever says so is--is a story-teller. I understand
all about that. The action could go on just the same, and I could be made
to pay for the necklace out of my own income if it hadn't been my own. I
am sure, Lord Fawn, such a clever man as you, and one who has always been
in the Government and in Parliament, can see that. And will anybody
believe that such an enemy as Mr. Camperdown has been to me, persecuting
me in every possible way, telling lies about everybody, who tried to
prevent my dear, darling husband from marrying me, that he wouldn't go on
with it if he could?"

"Mr. Camperdown is a very respectable man, Lady Eustace."

"Respectable! Talk to me of respectable after all that he has made me
suffer! As you were so fond of making inquiries, Lord Fawn, you ought to
have gone on with them. You never would believe what my cousin said."

"Your cousin always behaved very badly to me."

"My cousin, who is a brother rather than a cousin, has known how to
protect me from the injuries done to me, or rather, has known how to take
my part when I have been injured. My lord, as you have been unwilling to
believe him, why have you not gone to that gentleman who, as I say, is a
real lawyer? I don't know, my lord, that it need have concerned you at
all, but as you began, you surely should have gone on with it. Don't you
think so?" She was still standing up and, small as was her stature, was
almost menacing the unfortunate Under-Secretary of State, who was still
seated in his chair. "My lord," continued Lizzie, "I have had great wrong
done me."

"Do you mean by me?"

"Yes, by you. Who else has done it?"

"I do not think that I have done wrong to any one. I was obliged to say
that I could not recognise those diamonds as the property of my wife."

"But what right had you to say so? I had the diamonds when you asked me to
be your wife."

"I did not know it."

"Nor did you know that I had this little ring upon my finger. Is it fit
that you, or that any man should turn round upon a lady and say to her
that your word is to be broken, and that she is to be exposed before all
her friends, because you have taken a fancy to dislike her ring or her
brooch? I say, Lord Fawn, it was no business of yours, even after you were
engaged to me. What jewels I might have, or not have, was no concern of
yours till after I had become your wife. Go and ask all the world if it is
not so. You say that my cousin affronts you because he takes my part, like
a brother. Ask any one else. Ask any lady you may know. Let us name some
one to decide between us which of us has been wrong. Lady Glencora
Palliser is a friend of yours, and her husband is in the Government. Shall
we name her? It is true, indeed, that her uncle, the Duke of Omnium, the
grandest and greatest of English noblemen, is specially interested on my
behalf." This was very fine in Lizzie. The Duke of Omnium she had never
seen; but his name had been mentioned to her by Lady Glencora, and she was
quick to use it.

"I can admit of no reference to any one," said Lord Fawn.

"And I then, what am I to do? I am to be thrown over simply because your
lordship--chooses to throw me over. Your lordship will admit no reference
to any one! Your lordship makes inquiries as long as an attorney tells you
stories against me, but drops them at once when the attorney is made to
understand that he is wrong. Tell me this, sir. Can you justify yourself
in your own heart?"

Unfortunately for Lord Fawn, he was not sure that he could justify
himself. The diamonds were gone, and the action was laid aside, and the
general opinion which had prevailed a month or two since, that Lizzie had
been disreputably concerned in stealing her own necklace, seemed to have
been laid aside. Lady Glencora and the duke went for almost as much with
Lord Fawn as they did with Lizzie. No doubt the misbehaviour down among
the rocks was left to him; but he had that only on the evidence of Andy
Gowran, and even Andy Gowran's evidence he had declined to receive
otherwise than second-hand. Lizzie, too, was prepared with an answer to
this charge, an answer which she had already made more than once, though
the charge was not positively brought against her, and which consisted in
an assertion that Frank Greystock was her brother rather than her cousin.
Such brotherhood was not altogether satisfactory to Lord Fawn, when he
came once more to regard Lizzie Eustace as his possible future wife; but
still the assertion was an answer, and one that he could not altogether
reject.

It certainly was the case that he had again begun to think what would be
the result of a marriage with Lady Eustace. He must sever himself
altogether from Mrs. Hittaway, and must relax the closeness of his
relations with Fawn Court. He would have a wife respecting whom he himself
had spread evil tidings, and the man whom he most hated in the world would
be his wife's favourite cousin or, so to say, brother. He would, after a
fashion, be connected with Mrs. Carbuncle, Lord George de Brace
Carruthers, and Sir Griffin Tewett, all of whom he regarded as thoroughly
disreputable. And, moreover, at his own country house at Portray, as in
such case it would be, his own bailiff or steward would be the man who had
seen, what he had seen. These were great objections; but how was he to
avoid marrying? He was engaged to her. How, at any rate, was he to escape
from the renewal of his engagement at this moment? He had more than once
positively stated that he was deterred from marrying her only by her
possession of the diamonds. The diamonds were now gone.

Lizzie was still standing, waiting for an answer to her question: Can you
justify yourself in your own heart? Having paused for some seconds she
repeated her question in a stronger and more personal form. "Had I been
your sister, Lord Fawn, and had another man behaved to me as you have now
done, would you say that he had behaved well and that she had no ground
for complaint? Can you bring yourself to answer that question honestly?"

"I hope I shall answer no question dishonestly."

"Answer it then. No; you cannot answer it, because you would condemn
yourself. Now, Lord Fawn, what do you mean to do?"

"I had thought, Lady Eustace, that any regard which you might ever have
entertained for me--"

"Well; what had you thought of my regard?"

"That it had been dissipated."

"Have I told you so? Has any one come to you from me with such a message?"

"Have you not received attentions from any one else?"

"Attentions; what attentions? I have received plenty of attentions, most
flattering attentions. I was honoured even this morning by a most
gratifying attention on the part of his grace the Duke of Omnium."

"I did not mean that."

"What do you mean, then? I am not going to marry the Duke of Omnium
because of his attention, nor any one else. If you mean, sir, after the
other inquiries you have done me the honour to make, to throw it in my
face now, that I have--have in any way rendered myself unworthy of the
position of your wife because people have been civil and kind to me in my
sorrow, you are a greater dastard than I took you to be. Tell me at once,
sir, whom you mean."

It is hardly too much to say that the man quailed before her. And it
certainly is not too much to say that, had Lizzie Eustace been trained as
an actress, she would have become a favourite with the town. When there
came to her any fair scope for acting, she was perfect. In the ordinary
scenes of ordinary life, such as befell her during her visit to Fawn
Court, she could not acquit herself well. There was no reality about her,
and the want of it was strangely plain to most unobservant eyes. But give
her a part to play that required exaggerated, strong action, and she
hardly ever failed. Even in that terrible moment when, on her return from
the theatre, she thought that the police had discovered her secret about
the diamonds, though she nearly sank through fear, she still carried on
her acting in the presence of Lucinda Roanoke; and when she had found
herself constrained to tell the truth to Lord George Carruthers, the power
to personify a poor, weak, injured creature was not wanting to her. The
reader will not think that her position in society at the present moment
was very well established, will feel, probably, that she must still have
known herself to be on the brink of social ruin. But she had now fully
worked herself up to the necessities of the occasion, and was as able to
play her part as any actress that ever walked the boards. She had called
him a dastard, and now stood looking him in the face. "I didn't mean
anybody in particular," said Lord Fawn.

"Then what right can you have to ask me whether I have received
attentions? Had it not been for the affectionate attention of my cousin,
Mr. Greystock, I should have died beneath the load of sorrow you have
heaped upon me." This she said quite boldly, and yet the man she named was
he of whom Andy Gowran told his horrid story, and whose love-making to
Lizzie had, in Mrs. Hittaway's opinion, been sufficient to atone for any
falling off of strength in the matter of the diamonds.

"A rumour reached me," said Lord Fawn, plucking up his courage, "that you
were engaged to marry your cousin."

"Then rumour lied, my lord. And he or she who repeated the rumour to you,
lied also. And any he or she who repeats it again will go on with the
lie." Lord Fawn's brow became very black. The word "lie" itself was
offensive to him, offensive even though it might not be applied directly
to himself; but he still quailed, and was unable to express his
indignation--as he had done to poor Lucy Morris, his mother's governess.
"And now let me ask, Lord Fawn, on what ground you and I stand together.
When my friend Lady Glencora asked me, only this morning, whether my
engagement with you was still an existing fact, and brought me the kindest
possible message on the same subject from her uncle, the duke, I hardly
knew what answer to make her." It was not surprising that Lizzie in her
difficulties should use her new friend, but perhaps she overdid the
friendship a little. "I told her that we were engaged, but that your
lordship's conduct to me had been so strange that I hardly knew how to
speak of you among my friends."

"I thought I explained myself to your cousin."

"My cousin certainly did not understand your explanation."

Lord Fawn was certain that Greystock had understood it well; and Greystock
had in return insulted him because the engagement was broken off. But it
is impossible to argue on facts with a woman who has been ill-used. "After
all that has passed perhaps we had better part," said Lord Fawn.

"Then I shall put the matter into the hands of the Duke of Omnium," said
Lizzie boldly. "I will not have my whole life ruined, my good name
blasted--"

"I have not said a word to injure your good name."

"On what plea, then, have you dared to take upon yourself to put an end to
an engagement which was made at your own pressing request--which was, of
course, made at your own request On what ground do you justify such
conduct? You are a Liberal, Lord Fawn; and everybody regards the Duke of
Omnium as the head of the Liberal nobility in England. He is my friend,
and I shall put the matter into his hands." It was probably from her
cousin Frank that Lizzie had learned that Lord Fawn was more afraid of the
leaders of his own party than of any other tribunal upon earth--or perhaps
elsewhere.

Lord Fawn felt the absurdity of the threat, and yet it had effect upon
him. He knew that the Duke of Omnium was a worn-out old debauchee, with
one foot in the grave, who was looked after by two or three women who were
anxious only that he should not disgrace himself by some absurdity before
he died. Nevertheless the Duke of Omnium, or the duke name, was a power in
the nation. Lady Glencora was certainly very powerful, and Lady Glencora's
husband was Chancellor of the Exchequer. He did not suppose that the duke
cared in the least whether Lizzie Eustace was or was not married; but Lady
Glencora had certainly interested herself about Lizzie, and might make
London almost too hot to hold him if she chose to go about everywhere
saying that he ought to marry the lady. And in addition to all this
prospective grief, there was the trouble of the present moment. He was in
Lizzie's own room--fool that he had been to come there--and he must get
out as best he could. "Lady Eustace," he said, "I am most anxious not to
behave badly in this matter."

"But you are behaving badly--very badly."

"With your leave I will tell you what I would suggest. I will submit to
you in writing my opinion on this matter--" Lord Fawn had been all his
life submitting his opinion in writing, and thought that he was rather a
good hand at the work. "I will then endeavour to explain to you the
reasons which make me think that it will be better for us both that our
engagement should be at an end. If, after reading it, you shall disagree
with me, and still insist on the right which I gave you when I asked you
to become my wife, I will then perform the promise which I certainly
made." To this most foolish proposal on his part, Lizzie of course
acquiesced. She acquiesced, and bade him farewell with her sweetest smile.
It was now manifest to her that she could have her husband, or her
revenge, just as she might prefer.

This had been a day of triumph to her, and she was talking of it in the
evening triumphantly to Mrs. Carbuncle, when she was told that a policeman
wanted to see her down-stairs! Oh, those wretched police! Again all the
blood rushed to her head and nearly killed her. She descended slowly; and
was then informed by a man, not dressed like Bunfit, in plain clothes, but
with all the paraphernalia of a policeman's uniform, that her late
servant, Patience Crabstick, had given herself up as Queen's evidence, and
was now in custody in Scotland Yard. It had been thought right that she
should be so far informed; but the man was able to tell her nothing
further.




CHAPTER LXII

"YOU KNOW WHERE MY HEART IS"


On the Sunday following, Frank, as usual, was in Hertford Street. He had
become almost a favourite with Mrs. Carbuncle; and had so far ingratiated
himself even with Lucinda Roanoke that, according to Lizzie's report, he
might if so inclined rob Sir Griffin of his prize without much difficulty.
On this occasion he was unhappy and in low spirits; and when questioned on
the subject made no secret of the fact that he was harassed for money.
"The truth is, I have overdrawn my bankers by five hundred pounds, and
they have, as they say, ventured to remind me of it. I wish they were not
venturesome quite so often; for they reminded me of the same fact about a
fortnight ago."

"What do you do with your money, Mr. Greystock?" asked Mrs. Carbuncle
laughing.

"Muddle it away, paying my bills with it, according to the very, very old
story. The fact is I live in that detestable no man's land, between
respectability and insolvency, which has none of the pleasure of either. I
am fair game for every creditor, as I am supposed to pay my way, and yet I
never can pay my way."

"Just like my poor dear father," said Lizzie.

"Not exactly, Lizzie. He managed much better, and never paid anybody. If I
could only land on terra firma, one side or the other, I shouldn't much
care which. As it is, I have all the recklessness, but none of the
carelessness, of a hopelessly insolvent man. And it is so hard with us.
Attorneys owe us large sums of money, and we can't dun them very well. I
have a lot of money due to me from rich men, who don't pay me simply
because they don't think that it matters. I talk to them grandly, and look
big, as though money was the last thing I thought of, when I am longing to
touch my hat and ask them as a great favour to settle my little bill." All
this time Lizzie was full of matter which she must impart to her cousin,
and could impart to him only in privacy.

It was absolutely necessary that she should tell him what she had heard of
Patience Crabstick. In her heart of hearts she wished that Patience
Crabstick had gone off safely with her plunder to the Antipodes. She had
no wish to get back what had been lost, either in the matter of the
diamonds or of the smaller things taken. She had sincerely wished that the
police might fail in all their endeavours, and that the thieves might
enjoy perfect security with their booty. She did not even begrudge Mr.
Benjamin the diamonds--or Lord George, if in truth Lord George had been
the last thief. The robbery had enabled her to get the better of Mr.
Camperdown, and apparently of Lord Fawn; and had freed her from the
custody of property which she had learned to hate. It had been a very good
robbery. But now these wretched police had found Patience Crabstick and
would disturb her again!

Of course she must tell her cousin. He must hear the news, and it would be
better that he should hear it from her than from others. This was Sunday,
and she thought he would be sure to know the truth on the following
Monday. In this she was right: for on the Monday old Lady Linlithgow saw
it stated in the newspapers that an arrest had been made. "I have
something to tell you," she said, as soon as she had succeeded in finding
herself alone with him.

"Anything about the diamonds?"

"Well, no; not exactly about the diamonds; though perhaps it is. But
first, Frank, I want to say something else to you."

"Not about the diamonds?"

"Oh no; not at all. It is this. You must let me lend you that five hundred
pounds you want."

"Indeed, you shall do no such thing. I should not have mentioned it to you
if I had not thought that you were one of the insolvent yourself. You were
in debt yourself when we last talked about money."

"So I am; and that horrid woman, Mrs. Carbuncle, has made me lend her one
hundred and fifty pounds. But it is so different with you, Frank."

"Yes; my needs are greater than hers."

"What is she to me? while you are everything! Things can't be so bad with
me but what I can raise five hundred pounds. After all, I am not really in
debt, for a person with my income; but if I were, still my first duty
would be to help you if you want help."

"Be generous first, and just afterwards. That's it; isn't it, Lizzie? But
indeed, under no circumstances could I take a penny of your money. There
are some persons from whom a man can borrow and some from whom he cannot.
You are clearly one of those from whom I cannot borrow."

"Why not?"

"Ah, one can't explain these things. It simply is so. Mrs. Carbuncle was
quite the natural person to borrow your money, and it seems that she has
complied with nature. Some Jew who wants thirty per cent is the natural
person for me. All these things are arranged, and it is of no use
disturbing the arrangements and getting out of course. I shall pull
through. And now let me know your own news."

"The police have taken Patience."

"They have, have they? Then at last we shall know all about the diamonds."
This was gall to poor Lizzie. "Where did they get her?"

"Ah! I don't know that."

"And who told you?"

"A policeman came here last night and said so. She is going to turn
against the thieves and tell all that she knows. Nasty, mean creature."

"Thieves are nasty, mean creatures generally. We shall get it all out now
--as to what happened at Carlisle and what happened here. Do you know that
everybody believes, up to this moment, that your dear friend Lord George
de Bruce sold the diamonds to Mr. Benjamin the jeweller?"

Lizzie could only shrug her shoulders. She herself, among many doubts, was
upon the whole disposed to think as everybody thought. She did believe--as
far as she believed anything in the matter--that the Corsair had
determined to become possessed of the prize from the moment that he saw it
in Scotland; that the Corsair arranged the robbery in Carlisle, and that
again he arranged the robbery in the London house as soon as he learned
from Lizzie where the diamonds were placed. To her mind this had been the
most ready solution of the mystery, and when she found that other people
almost regarded him as the thief, her doubts became a belief. And she did
not in the least despise or dislike him or condemn him for what he had
done. Were he to come to her and confess it all, telling his story in such
a manner as to make her seem to be safe for the future, she would
congratulate him and accept him at once as her own dear, expected Corsair.
But if so, he should not have bungled the thing. He should have managed
his subordinates better than to have one of them turn evidence against
him. He should have been able to get rid of a poor weak female like
Patience Crabstick. Why had he not sent her to New York, or--or--or
anywhere? If Lizzie were to hear that Lord George had taken Patience out
to sea in a yacht--somewhere among the bright islands of which she thought
so much--and dropped the girl overboard, tied up in a bag, she would
regard it as a proper Corsair arrangement. Now she was angry with Lord
George because her trouble was coming back upon her. Frank had suggested
that Lord George was the robber in chief, and Lizzie merely shrugged her
shoulders. "We shall know all about it now," said he triumphantly.

"I don't know that I want to know any more about it. I have been so
tortured about these wretched diamonds that I never wish to hear them
mentioned again. I don't care who has got them. My enemies used to think
that I loved them so well that I could not bear to part with them. I hated
them always, and never took any pleasure in them. I used to think that I
would throw them into the sea; and when they were gone I was glad of it."

"Thieves ought to be discovered, Lizzie, for the good of the community."

"I don't care for the community. What has the community ever done for me?
And now I have something else to tell you. Ever so many people came
yesterday as well as that wretched policeman. Dear Lady Glencora was here
again."

"They'll make a Radical of you among them, Lizzie."

"I don't care a bit about that. I'd just as soon be a Radical as a stupid
old Conservative. Lady Glencora has been most kind, and she brought me the
dearest message from the Duke of Omnium. The duke had heard how ill I had
been treated."

"The duke is doting."

"It is so easy to say that when a man is old. I don't think you know him,
Frank."

"Not in the least; nor do I wish."

"It is something to have the sympathy of men high placed in the world. And
as to Lady Glencora, I do love her dearly. She just comes up to my beau
ideal of what a woman should be--disinterested, full of spirit,
affectionate, with a dash of romance about her."

"A great dash of romance, I fancy."

"And a determination to be something in the world. Lady Glencora Palliser
is something."

"She is awfully rich, Lizzie."

"I suppose so. At any rate, that is no disgrace. And then, Frank, somebody
else came."

"Lord Fawn was to have come."

"He did come."

"And how did it go between you?"

"Ah, that will be so difficult to explain. I wish you had been behind the
curtain to hear it all. It is so necessary that you should know, and yet
it is so hard to tell. I spoke up to him, and was quite high-spirited."

"I dare say you were."

"I told him out bravely of all the wrong he had done me. I did not sit and
whimper, I can assure you. Then he talked about you--of your attentions."

Frank Greystock, of course, remembered the scene among the rocks, and Mr.
Gowran's wagging head and watchful eyes. At the time he had felt certain
that some use would be made of Andy's vigilance, though he had not traced
the connection between the man and Mrs. Hittaway. If Lord Fawn had heard
of the little scene, there might doubtless be cause for him to talk of
"attentions" "What did it matter to him?" asked Frank. "He is an insolent
ass--as I have told him once, and shall have to tell him again."

"I think it did matter, Frank."

"I don't see it a bit. He had resigned his rights--whatever they were."

"But I had not accepted his resignation--as they say in the newspapers--
nor have I now."

"You would still marry him?"

"I don't say that, Frank. This is an important business, and let us go
through it steadily. I would certainly like to have him again at my feet.
Whether I would deign to lift him up again is another thing. Is not that
natural, after what he has done to me?"

"Woman's nature."

"And I am a woman. Yes, Frank. I would have him again at my disposal--and
he is so. He is to write me a long letter; so like a Government-man--isn't
it? And he has told me already what he is to put in the letter. They
always do, you know. He is to say that he'll marry me if I choose."

"He has promised to say that?"

"When he said that he would come, I made up my mind that he should not go
out of the house till he had promised that. He couldn't get out of it.
What had I done?" Frank thought of the scene among the rocks. He did not,
of course, allude to it, but Lizzie was not so reticent. "As to what that
old rogue saw down in Scotland, I don't care a bit about it, Frank. He has
been up in London, and telling them all, no doubt. Nasty, dirty
eavesdropper! But what does it come to? Psha! When he mentioned your name
I silenced him at once. What could I have done, unless I had had some
friend? At any rate, he is to ask me again in writing--and then what shall
I say?"

"You must consult your own heart."

"No, Frank; I need not do that. Why do you say so?"

"I know not what else to say."

"A woman can marry without consulting her heart. Women do so every day.
This man is a lord, and has a position. No doubt I despise him thoroughly
--utterly. I don't hate him, because he is not worth being hated."

"And yet you would marry him?"

"I have not said so. I will tell you this truth, though perhaps you will
say it is not feminine. I would fain marry some one. To be as I have been
for the last two years is not a happy condition."

"I would not marry a man I despised."

"Nor would I--willingly. He is honest and respectable; and in spite of all
that has come and gone would, I think, behave well to a woman when she was
once his wife. Of course, I would prefer to marry a man that I could love.
But if that is impossible, Frank----"

"I thought that you had determined that you would have nothing to do with
this lord."

"I thought so too. Frank, you have known all that I have thought, and all
that I have wished. You talk to me of marrying where my heart has been
given. Is it possible that I should do so?"

"How am I to say?"

"Come, Frank, be true with me. I am forcing myself to speak truth to you.
I think that between you and me, at any rate, there should be no words
spoken that are not true. Frank, you know where my heart is." As she said
this she stood over him and laid her hand upon his shoulder. "Will you
answer me one question?"

"If I can, I will."

"Are you engaged to marry Lucy Morris?"

"I am."

"And you intend to marry her?" To this question he made no immediate
answer. "We are old enough now, Frank, to know that something more than
what you call heart is wanted to make us happy when we marry. I will say
nothing hard of Lucy, though she be my rival."

"You can say nothing hard of her. She is perfect."

"We will let that pass, though it is hardly kind of you, just at the
present moment. Let her be perfect. Can you marry this perfection without
a sixpence--you that are in debt, and who never could save a sixpence in
your life? Would it be for her good--or for yours? You have done a foolish
thing, sir, and you know that you must get out of it."

"I know nothing of the kind."

"You cannot marry Lucy Morris. That is the truth. My present need makes me
bold. Frank, shall I be your wife? Such a marriage will not be without
love, at any rate on one side, though there be utter indifference on the
other."

"You know I am not indifferent to you," said he, with wicked weakness.

"Now at any rate," she continued, "you must understand what must be my
answer to Lord Fawn. It is you that must answer Lord Fawn. If my heart is
to be broken, I may as well break it under his roof as another."

"I have no roof to offer you," he said. "But I have one for you." she
said, throwing her arm round his neck. He bore her embrace for a minute,
returning it with the pressure of his arm; and then, escaping from it,
seized his hat and left her standing in the room.




CHAPTER LXIII

THE CORSAIR IS AFRAID


On the following morning--Monday morning--there appeared in one of the
daily newspapers the paragraph of which Lady Linlithgow had spoken to Lucy
Morris. "We are given to understand"--newspapers are very frequently given
to understand--"that a man well-known to the London police as an
accomplished housebreaker has been arrested in reference to the robbery
which was effected on the 30th of January last at Lady Eustace's house in
Hertford Street. No doubt the same person was concerned in the robbery of
her ladyship's jewels at Carlisle on the night of the 8th of January. The
mystery which has so long enveloped these two affairs, and which has been
so discreditable to the metropolitan police, will now probably be cleared
up." There was not a word about Patience Crabstick in this; and, as Lizzie
observed, the news brought by the policeman on Saturday night referred
only to Patience, and said nothing of the arrest of any burglar. The
ladies in Hertford street scanned the sentence with the greatest care, and
Mrs. Carbuncle was very angry because the house was said to be Lizzie's
house.

"It wasn't my doing," said Lizzie.

"The policeman came to you about it."

"I didn't say a word to the man, and I didn't want him to come."

"I hope it will be all found out now," said Lucinda.

"I wish it were all clean forgotten," said Lizzie.

"It ought to be found out," said Mrs. Carbuncle. "But the police should be
more careful in what they say. I suppose we shall all have to go before
the magistrates again."

Poor Lizzie felt that fresh trouble was certainly coming upon her. She had
learned now that the crime for which she might be prosecuted and punished
was that of perjury, that even if everything was known, she could not be
accused of stealing, and that if she could only get out of the way till
the wrath of the magistrate and policemen should have evaporated, she
might possibly escape altogether. At any rate, they could not take her
income away from her. But how could she get out of the way, and how could
she endure to be cross-examined, and looked at, and inquired into, by all
those who would be concerned in the matter? She thought that, if only she
could have arranged her matrimonial affairs before the bad day came upon
her, she could have endured it better. If she might be allowed to see Lord
George, she could ask for advice--could ask for advice, not as she was
always forced to do from her cousin, on a false statement of facts, but
with everything known and declared.

On that very day Lord George came to Hertford Street. He had been there
more than once, perhaps half a dozen times, since the robbery; but on all
these occasions Lizzie had been in bed, and he had declined to visit her
in her chamber. In fact, even Lord George had become somewhat afraid of
her since he had been told the true story as to the necklace at Carlisle.
That story he had heard from herself, and he had also heard from Mr.
Benjamin some other little details as to her former life. Mr. Benjamin,
whose very close attention had been drawn to the Eustace diamonds, had
told Lord George how he had valued them at her ladyship's request, and had
caused an iron case to be made for them, and how her ladyship had on one
occasion endeavoured to sell the necklace to him. Mr. Benjamin, who
certainly was intimate with Lord George, was very fond of talking about
the diamonds, and had once suggested to his lordship that, were they to
become his lordship's by marriage, he, Benjamin, might be willing to treat
with his lordship. In regard to treating with her ladyship, Mr. Benjamin
acknowledged that he thought it would be too hazardous. Then came the
robbery of the box, and Lord George was all astray. Mr. Benjamin was for a
while equally astray, but neither friend believed in the other friend's
innocence. That Lord George should suspect Mr. Benjamin was quite natural.
Mr. Benjamin hardly knew what to think; hardly gave Lord George credit for
the necessary courage, skill, and energy. But at last, as he began to put
two and two together, he divined the truth, and was enabled to set the
docile Patience on the watch over her mistress's belongings. So it had
been with Mr. Benjamin, who at last was able to satisfy Mr. Smiler and Mr.
Cann that he had been no party to their cruel disappointment at Carlisle.
How Lord George had learned the truth has been told; the truth as to
Lizzie's hiding the necklace under her pillow and bringing it up to London
in her desk. But of the facts of the second robbery he knew nothing up to
this morning. He almost suspected that Lizzie had herself again been at
work, and he was afraid of her. He had promised her that he would take
care of her, had perhaps said enough to make her believe that some day he
would marry her. He hardly remembered what he had said; but he was afraid
of her. She was so wonderfully clever that, if he did not take care, she
would get him into some mess from which he would be unable to extricate
himself.

He had never whispered her secret to any one; and had still been at a loss
about the second robbery, when he too saw the paragraph in the newspaper.
He went direct to Scotland Yard and made inquiry there. His name had been
so often used in the affair, that such inquiry from him was justified.

"Well, my lord; yes; we have found out something," said Bunfit. "Mr.
Benjamin is off, you know."

"Benjamin off?"

"Cut the painter, my lord, and started. But what's the good, now we has
the wires?"

"And who were the thieves?"

"Ah, my lord, that's telling. Perhaps I don't know. Perhaps I do. Perhaps
two or three of us knows. You'll hear all in good time, my lord." Mr.
Bunfit wished to appear communicative because he knew but little himself.
Gager, in the meanest possible manner, had kept the matter very close; but
the fact that Mr. Benjamin had started suddenly on foreign travel had
become known to Mr. Bunfit.

Lord George had been very careful, asking no question about the necklace;
no question which would have shown that he knew that the necklace had been
in Hertford Street when the robbery took place there; but it seemed to him
now that the police must be aware that it was so. The arrest had been made
because of the robbery in Hertford Street, and because of that arrest Mr.
Benjamin had taken his departure. Mr. Benjamin was too big a man to have
concerned himself deeply in the smaller matters which had then been
stolen.

From Scotland Yard Lord George went direct to Hertford Street. He was in
want of money, in want of a settled home, in want of a future income, and
altogether unsatisfied with his present mode of life. Lizzie Eustace, no
doubt, would take him, unless she had told her secret to some other lover.
To have his wife, immediately on her marriage, or even before it,
arraigned for perjury, would not be pleasant. There was very much in the
whole affair of which he would not be proud as he led his bride to the
altar; but a man does not expect to get four thousand pounds a year for
nothing. Lord George, at any rate, did not conceive himself to be in a
position to do so. Had there not been something crooked about Lizzie, a
screw loose, as people say, she would never have been within his reach.
There are men who always ride lame horses, and yet see as much of the
hunting as others. Lord George, when he had begun to think that, after the
tale which he had forced her to tell him, she had caused the diamonds to
be stolen by her own maid out of her own desk, became almost afraid of
her. But now, as he looked at the matter again and again, he believed that
the second robbery had been genuine. He did not quite make up his mind,
but he went to Hertford Street resolved to see her.

He asked for her, and was shown at once into her own sitting^ room. "So
you have come at last," she said.

"Yes; I've come at last. It would not have done for me to come up to you
when you were in bed. Those women downstairs would have talked about it
everywhere."

"I suppose they would," said Lizzie almost piteously.

"It wouldn't have been at all wise after all that has been said. People
would have been sure to suspect that I had got the things out of your
desk."

"Oh, no; not that."

"I wasn't going to run the risk, my dear." His manner to her was anything
but civil, anything but complimentary. If this was his Corsair humour, she
was not sure that a Corsair might be agreeable to her. "And now tell me
what you know about this second robbery."

"I know nothing, Lord George."

"Oh, yes, you do. You know something. You know, at any rate, that the
diamonds were there."

"Yes; I know that."

"And that they were taken?"

"Of course they were taken."

"You are sure of that?" There was something in his manner absolutely
insolent to her. Frank was affectionate, and even Lord Fawn treated her
with deference. "Because, you know, you have been very clever. To tell you
the truth, I did not think at first that they had been really stolen. It
might, you know, have been a little game to get them out of your own
hands, between you and your maid."

"I don't know what you take me for, Lord George."

"I take you for a lady who for a long time got the better of the police
and the magistrates, and who managed to shift all the trouble off your own
shoulders on to those of other people. You have heard that they have taken
one of the thieves?"

"And they have got the girl."

"Have they? I didn't know that. That scoundrel Benjamin has levanted too."

"Levanted!" said Lizzie, raising both her hands.

"Not an hour too soon, my lady. And now what do you mean to do?"

"What ought I to do?"

"Of course the whole truth will come out."

"Must it come out?"

"Not a doubt of that. How can it be helped?"

"You won't tell. You promised that you would not."

"Psha; promised! If they put me in a witness-box of course I must tell.
When you come to this kind of work, promises don't go for much. I don't
know that they ever do. What is a broken promise?"

"It's a story," said Lizzie, in innocent amazement.

"And what was it you told when you were upon your oath at Carlisle; and
again when the magistrate came here?"

"Oh, Lord George; how unkind you are to me!"

"Patience Crabstick will tell it all, without any help from me. Don't you
see that the whole thing must be known? She'll say where the diamonds were
found; and how did they come there, if you didn't put them there? As for
telling, there'll be telling enough. You've only two things to do."

"What are they, Lord George?"

"Go off, like Mr. Benjamin; or else make a clean breast of it. Send for
John Eustace and tell him the whole. For his brother's sake he'll make the
best of it. It will all be published, and then perhaps there will be an
end of it."

"I couldn't do that, Lord George," said Lizzie, bursting into tears.

"You ask me, and I can only tell you what I think. That you should be able
to keep the history of the diamonds a secret, does not seem to me to be
upon the cards. No doubt people who are rich, and are connected with rich
people, and have great friends--who are what the world call swells--have
great advantages over their inferiors when they get into trouble. You are
the widow of a baronet, and you have an uncle a bishop, and another a
dean, and a countess for an aunt. You have a brother-in-law and a first-
cousin in Parliament, and your father was an admiral. The other day you
were engaged to marry a peer."

"Oh yes," said Lizzie, "and Lady Glencora Palliser is my particular
friend."

"She is; is she? So much the better. Lady Glencora, no doubt, is a very
swell among swells."

"The Duke of Omnium would do anything for me," said Lizzie with
enthusiasm.

"If you were nobody, you would of course be indicted for perjury, and
would go to prison. As it is, if you will tell all your story to one of
your swell friends, I think it very likely that you may be pulled through.
I should say that Mr. Eustace, or your cousin Greystock, would be the
best."

"Why couldn't you do it? You know it all. I told you because--because--
because I thought you would be the kindest to me."

"You told me, my dear, because you thought it would not matter much with
me, and I appreciate the compliment. I can do nothing for you. I am not
near enough to those who wear wigs."

Lizzie did not above half understand him--did not at all understand him
when he spoke of those who wore wigs, and was quite dark to his irony
about her great friends--but she did perceive that he was in earnest in
recommending her to confess. She thought about it for a moment in silence,
and the more she thought the more she felt that she could not do it. Had
he not suggested a second alternative--that she should go off, like Mr.
Benjamin? It might be possible that she should go off, and yet be not
quite like Mr. Benjamin. In that case ought she not to go under the
protection of her Corsair? Would not that be the proper way of going?

"Might I not go abroad, just for a time?" she asked.

"And so let it blow over?"

"Just so, you know."

"It is possible that you might," he said. "Not that it would blow over
altogether. Everybody would know it. It is too late now to stop the
police, and if you meant to be off you should be off at once--to-day or
to-morrow."

"Oh, dear!"

"Indeed, there's no saying whether they will let you go. You could start
now, this moment; and if you were at Dover could get over to France. But
when once it is known that you had the necklace all that time in your own
desk, any magistrate, I imagine, could stop you. You'd better have some
lawyer you can trust; not that blackguard Mopus."

Lord George had certainly brought her no comfort. When he told her that
she might go at once if she chose, she remembered, with a pang of agony,
that she had already overdrawn her account at the bankers. She was the
actual possessor of an income of four thousand pounds a year, and now, in
her terrible strait, she could not stir because she had no money with
which to travel. Had all things been well with her, she could, no doubt,
have gone to her bankers and have arranged this little difficulty. But as
it was she could not move, because her purse was empty.

Lord George sat looking at her and thinking whether he would make the
plunge and ask her to be his wife, with all her impediments and drawbacks
about her. He had been careful to reduce her to such a condition of
despair that she would undoubtedly have accepted him so that she might
have some one to lean upon in her trouble; but as he looked at her he
doubted. She was such a mass of deceit that he was afraid of her. She
might say that she would marry him, and then, when the storm was over,
refuse to keep her word. She might be in debt almost to any amount. She
might be already married for anything that he knew. He did know that she
was subject to all manner of penalties for what she had done. He looked at
her and told himself that she was very pretty. But in spite of her beauty
his judgment went against her. He did not dare to share his--even his--
boat with so dangerous a fellow-passenger.

"That's my advice," he said, getting up from his chair,

"Are you going?"

"Well; yes; I don't know what else I can do for you."

"You are so unkind." He shrugged his shoulders, just touched her hand, and
left the room without saying another word to her.




CHAPTER LXIV

LIZZIE'S LAST SCHEME


Lizzie, when she was left alone, was very angry with the Corsair--in truth
more sincerely angry that she had ever been with any of her lovers, or
perhaps with any human being. Sincere, true, burning wrath was not the
fault to which she was most exposed. She could snap and snarl and hate,
and say severe things. She could quarrel, and fight, and be malicious. But
to be full of real wrath was uncommon with her. Now she was angry. She had
been civil, more than civil, to Lord George. She had opened her house to
him and her heart. She had told him her great secret. She had implored his
protection. She had thrown herself into his arms. And now he had rejected
her. That he should have been rough to her was only in accordance with the
poetical attributes which she had attributed to him. But his roughness
should have been streaked with tenderness. He should not have left her
roughly. In the whole interview he had not said a loving word to her. He
had given her advice--which might be good or bad--but he had given it as
to one whom he despised. He had spoken to her throughout the interview
exactly as he might have spoken to Sir Griffin Tewett. She could not
analyse her feelings thoroughly, but she felt that because of what had
passed between them, by reason of his knowledge of her secret, he had
robbed her of all that observance which was due to her as a woman and a
lady. She had been roughly used before, by people of inferior rank who had
seen through her ways. Andrew Gowran had insulted her. Patience Crabstick
had argued with her. Benjamin, the employer of thieves, had been familiar
with her. But hitherto, in what she was pleased to call her own set, she
had always been treated with that courtesy which ladies seldom fail to
receive. She understood it all. She knew how much of mere word-service
there often is in such complimentary usage. But, nevertheless, it implies
respect and an acknowledgment of the position of her who is so respected.
Lord George had treated her as one schoolboy treats another.

And he had not spoken to her one word of love. Love will excuse roughness.
Spoken love will palliate even spoken roughness. Had he once called her
his own Lizzie, he might have scolded her as he pleased--might have abused
her to the top of his bent. But as there had been nothing of the manner of
a gentleman to a lady, so also had there been nothing of the lover to his
mistress. That dream was over. Lord George was no longer a Corsair, but a
brute.

But what should she do? Even a brute may speak truth. She was to have gone
to a theatre that evening with Mrs. Carbuncle, but she stayed at home
thinking over her position. She heard nothing throughout the day from the
police; and she made up her mind that, unless she were stopped by the
police, she would go to Scotland on the day but one following. She thought
that she was sure that she would do so; but of course she must be guided
by events as they occurred. She wrote, however, to Miss Macnulty saying
that she would come, and she told Mrs. Carbuncle of her proposed journey
as that lady was leaving the house for the theatre. On the following
morning, however, news came which again made her journey doubtful. There
was another paragraph in the newspaper about the robbery, acknowledging
the former paragraph to have been in some respect erroneous. "The
accomplished housebreaker" had not been arrested. A confederate of the
"accomplished housebreaker" was in the hands of the police, and the police
were on the track of the "accomplished housebreaker" himself. Then there
was a line or two alluding in a very mysterious way to the disappearance
of a certain jeweller. Taking it altogether, Lizzie thought that there was
ground for hope, and that at any rate there would be delay. She would
perhaps put off going to Scotland for yet a day or two. Was it not
necessary that she should wait for Lord Fawn's answer; and would it not be
incumbent on her cousin Frank to send her some account of himself after
the abrupt manner in which he had left her?

If in real truth she should be driven to tell her story to any one, and
she began to think that she was so driven, she would tell it to him. She
believed more in his regard for her than that of any other human being.
She thought that he would in truth have been devoted to her, had he not
become entangled with that wretched little governess. And she thought that
if he could see his way out of that scrape, he would marry her even yet;
would marry her, and be good to her, so that her dream of a poetical phase
of life should not be altogether dissolved. After all, the diamonds were
her own. She had not stolen them. When perplexed in the extreme by
magistrates and policemen, with nobody near her whom she trusted to give
her advice--for Lizzie now of course declared to herself that she had
never for a moment trusted the Corsair--she had fallen into an error, and
said what was not true. As she practised it before the glass, she thought
that she could tell her story in a becoming manner, with becoming tears,
to Frank Greystock. And were it not for Lucy Morris, she thought that he
would take her with all her faults and all her burdens.

As for Lord Fawn, she knew well enough that, let him write what he would,
and renew his engagement in what most formal manner might be possible, he
would be off again when he learned the facts as to that night at Carlisle.
She had brought him to succumb, because he could no longer justify his
treatment of her by reference to the diamonds. But when once all the world
should know that she had twice perjured herself, his justification would
be complete and his escape would be certain. She would use his letter
simply to achieve that revenge which she had promised herself. Her effort
--her last final effort--must be made to secure the hand and heart of her
cousin Frank. "Ah, 'tis his heart I want," she said to herself.

She must settle something before she went to Scotland, if there was
anything that could be settled. If she could only get a promise from Frank
before all her treachery had been exposed, he probably would remain true
to his promise. He would not desert her as Lord Fawn had done. Then, after
much thinking of it, she resolved upon a scheme which, of all her schemes,
was the wickedest. Whatever it might cost her, she would create a
separation between Frank Greystock and Lucy Morris. Having determined upon
this, she wrote to Lucy, asking her to call in Hertford Street at a
certain hour.

"DEAR LUCY: I particularly want to see you, on business. Pray come to me
at twelve to-morrow. I will send the carriage for you, and it will take
you back again. Pray do this. We used to love one another, and I am sure I
love you still. "Your affectionate old friend,

"LIZZIE."

As a matter of course, Lucy went to her. Lizzie, before the interview,
studied the part she was to play with all possible care, even to the words
which she was to use. The greeting was at first kindly, for Lucy had
almost forgotten the bribe that had been offered to her, and had quite
forgiven it. Lizzie Eustace never could be dear to her; but, so Lucy had
thought during her happiness, this former friend of hers was the cousin of
the man who was to be her husband, and was dear to him. Of course she had
forgiven the offence. "And now, dear, I want to ask you a question,"
Lizzie said; "or rather, perhaps not a question. I can do it better than
that. I think that my cousin Frank once talked of--of making you his
wife." Lucy answered not a word, but she trembled in every limb, and the
colour came to her face. "Was it not so, dear?"

"What if it was? I don't know why you should ask me any question like that
about myself."

"Is he not my cousin?"

"Yes, he is your cousin. Why don't you ask him? You see him every day, I
suppose?"

"Nearly every day."

"Why do you send for me, then?"

"It is so hard to tell you, Lucy. I have sent to you in good faith, and in
love. I could have gone to you, only for the old vulture, who would not
have let us had a word in peace. I do see him, constantly. And I love him
dearly."

"That is nothing to me," said Lucy. Anybody hearing them, and not knowing
them, would have said that Lucy's manner was harsh in the extreme.

"He has told me everything." Lizzie, when she said this, paused, looking
at her victim. "He has told me things which he could not mention to you.
It was only yesterday--the day before yesterday--that he was speaking to
me of his debts. I offered to place all that I have at his disposal, so as
to free him, but he would not take my money."

"Of course he would not."

"Not my money alone. Then he told me that he was engaged to you. He had
never told me before, but yet I knew it. It all came out then. Lucy,
though he is engaged to you, it is me that he loves."

"I don't believe it," said Lucy.

"You can't make me angry, Lucy, because my heart bleeds for you."

"Nonsense! trash! I don't want your heart to bleed. I don't believe you've
got a heart. You've got money; I know that."

"And he has got none. If I did not love him, why should I wish to give him
all that I have? Is not that disinterested?"

"No. You are always thinking of yourself. You couldn't be disinterested."

"And of whom are you thinking? Are you doing the best for him--a man in
his position, without money, ambitious, sure to succeed, if want of money
does not stop him--in wishing him to marry a girl with nothing? Cannot I
do more for him than you can?"

"I could work for him on my knees, I love him so truly."

"Would that do him any service? He cannot marry you. Does he ever see you?
Does he write to you as though you were to be his wife? Do you not know
that it is all over?--that it must be over? It is impossible that he
should marry you. But if you will give him back his word, he shall be my
husband, and shall have all that I possess. Now, let us see who loves him
best."

"I do," said Lucy.

"How will you show it?"

"There is no need that I should show it. He knows it. The only one in the
world to whom I wish it to be known, knows it already well enough. Did you
send to me for this?"

"Yes--for this."

"It is for him to tell me the tidings--not for you. You are nothing to me
--nothing. And what you say to me now is all for yourself--not for him.
But it is true that he does not see me. It is true that he does not write
to me. You may tell him from me--for I cannot write to him myself--that he
may do whatever is best for him. But if you tell him that I do not love
him better than all the world, you will lie to him. And if you say that he
loves you better than he does me, that also will be a lie. I know his
heart."

"But, Lucy--"

"I will hear no more. He can do as he pleases. If money be more to him
than love and honesty, let him marry you. I shall never trouble him; he
may be sure of that. As for you, Lizzie, I hope that we may never meet
again."

She would not get into the Eustace-Carbuncle carriage, which was waiting
for her at the door, but walked back to Bruton Street. She did not doubt
but that it was all over with her now. That Lizzie Eustace was an
inveterate liar, she knew well; but she did believe that the liar had on
this occasion been speaking truth. Lady Fawn was not a liar, and Lady Fawn
had told her the same. And, had she wanted more evidence, did not her
lover's conduct give it? "It is because I am poor," she said to herself--
"for I know well that he loves me."




CHAPTER LXV

TRIBUTE


Lizzie put off her journey to Scotland from day to day, though her cousin
Frank continually urged upon her the expediency of going. There were
various reasons, he said, why she should go. Her child was there, and it
was proper that she should be with her child. She was living at present
with people whose reputation did not stand high, and as to whom all manner
of evil reports were flying about the town. It was generally thought--so
said Frank--that that Lord George de Bruce Carruthers had assisted Mr.
Benjamin in stealing the diamonds, and Frank himself did not hesitate to
express his belief in the accusation.

"Oh no, that cannot be," said Lizzie, trembling. But, though she rejected
the supposition, she did not reject it very firmly. "And then, you know,"
continued Lizzie, "I never see him. I have actually only set eyes on him
once since the second robbery, and then just for a minute. Of course I
used to know him--down at Portray--but now we are strangers." Frank went
on with his objections. He declared that the manner in which Mrs.
Carbuncle had got up the match between Lucinda Roanoke and Sir Griffin was
shameful--all the world was declaring that it was shameful--that she had
not a penny, that the girl was an adventurer, and that Sir Griffin was an
obstinate, pig-headed, ruined idiot. It was expedient on every account
that Lizzie should take herself away from that "lot." The answer that
Lizzie desired to make was very simple. Let me go as your betrothed bride,
and I will start to-morrow to Scotland or elsewhere, as you may direct.
Let that little affair be settled, and I shall be quite as willing to get
out of London as you can be to send me. But I am in such a peck of
troubles that something must be settled. And as it seems that after all
the police are still astray about the necklace, perhaps I needn't run away
from them for a little while even yet. She did not say this. She did not
even in so many words make the first proposition. But she did endeavour to
make Frank understand that she would obey his dictation if he would earn
the right to dictate. He either did not or would not understand her, and
then she became angry with him or pretended to be angry.

"Really, Frank," she said, "you are hardly fair to me."

"In what way am I unfair?"

"You come here and abuse all my friends, and tell me to go here and go
there, just as though I were a child. And--and--and--"

"And what, Lizzie?"

"You know what I mean. You are one thing one day, and one another. I hope
Miss Lucy Morris was quite well when you last heard from her?"

"You have no right to speak to me of Lucy--at least, not in
disparagement."

"You are treating her very badly--you know that."

"I am."

"Then why don't you give it up? Why don't you let her have her chances--to
do what she can with them? You know very well that you can't marry her.
You know that you ought not to have asked her. You talk of Miss Roanoke
and Sir Griffin Tewett. There are people quite as bad as Sir Griffin, or
Mrs. Carbuncle either. Don't suppose I am speaking for myself. I've given
up all that idle fancy long ago. I shall never marry a second time myself.
I have made up my mind to that. I have suffered too much already." Then
she burst into tears.

He dried her tears and comforted her, and forgave all the injurious things
she had said of him. It is almost impossible for a man--a man under forty
and unmarried, and who is not a philosopher--to have familiar and
affectionate intercourse with a beautiful young woman, and carry it on as
he might do with a friend of the other sex. In his very heart Greystock
despised this woman; he had told himself over and over again that were
there no Lucy in the case he would not marry her; that she was affected,
unreal--and in fact a liar in every word and look and motion which came
from her with premeditation. Judging, not from her own account, but from
circumstances as he saw them, and such evidence as had reached him, he did
not condemn her in reference to the diamonds. He had never for a moment
conceived that she had secreted them. He acquitted her altogether from
those special charges which had been widely circulated against her; but
nevertheless he knew her to be heartless and bad. He had told himself a
dozen times that it would be well for him that she should be married and
taken out of his hands. And yet he loved her after a fashion, and was
prone to sit near her, and was fool enough to be flattered by her
caresses. When she would lay her hand on his arm, a thrill of pleasure
went through him. And yet he would willingly have seen any decent man take
her and marry her, making a bargain that he should never see her again.
Young or old, men are apt to become Merlins when they encounter Viviens.
On this occasion he left her, disgusted indeed, but not having told her
that he was disgusted. "Come again, Frank, to-morrow, won't you?" she
said. He made her no promise as he went, nor had she expected it. He had
left her quite abruptly the other day, and he now went away almost in the
same fashion. But she was not surprised. She understood that the task she
had in hand was one very difficult to be accomplished--and she did
perceive in some dark way that, good as her acting was, it was not quite
good enough. Lucy held her ground because she was real. You may knock
about a diamond and not even scratch it, whereas paste in rough usage
betrays itself. Lizzie, with all her self-assuring protestations, knew
that she was paste, and knew that Lucy was real stone. Why could she not
force herself to act a little better, so that the paste might be as good
as the stone--might at least seem to be as good? "If he despises me now,
what will he say when he finds it all out?" she asked herself.

As for Frank Greystock himself, though he had quite made up his mind about
Lizzie Eustace, he was still in doubt about the other girl. At the present
moment he was making over two thousand pounds a year, and yet was more in
debt now than he had been a year ago. When he attempted to look at his
affairs, he could not even remember what had become of his money. He did
not gamble. He had no little yacht, costing him about six hundred a year.
He kept one horse in London, and one only. He had no house. And when he
could spare time from his work, he was generally entertained at the houses
of his friends. And yet from day to day his condition seemed to become
worse and worse. It was true that he never thought of half-a-sovereign;
that in calling for wine at his club he was never influenced by the cost;
that it seemed to him quite rational to keep a cab waiting for him half
the day, that in going or coming he never calculated expense, that in
giving an order to a tailor he never dreamed of anything beyond his own
comfort. Nevertheless, when he recounted with pride his great economies,
reminding himself that he, a successful man, with a large income and no
family, kept neither hunters, nor yacht, nor moor, and that he did not
gamble, he did think it very hard that he should be embarrassed. But he
was embarrassed, and in that condition could it be right for him to marry
a girl without a shilling?

In these days Mrs. Carbuncle was very urgent with her friend not to leave
London till after the marriage. Lizzie had given no promise, had only been
induced to promise that the loan of one hundred and fifty pounds should
not be held to have any bearing on the wedding present to be made to
Lucinda. That could be got on credit from Messrs. Harter & Benjamin; for
though Mr. Benjamin was absent--on a little tour through Europe in search
of precious stones in the cheap markets old Mr. Harter suggested--the
business went on the same as ever. There was a good deal of consultation
about the present, and Mrs. Carbuncle at last decided, no doubt with the
concurrence of Miss Roanoke, that it should consist simply of silver forks
and spoons--real silver as far as the money would go. Mrs. Carbuncle
herself went with her friend to select the articles--as to which perhaps
we shall do her no injustice in saying that a ready sale, should such a
lamentable occurrence ever become necessary, was one of the objects which
she had in view. Mrs. Carbuncle's investigations as to the quality of the
metal quite won Mr. Harter's respect; and it will probably be thought that
she exacted no more than justice--seeing that the thing had become a
matter of bargain--in demanding that the thirty-five pounds should be
stretched to fifty, because the things were bought on long credit. "My
dear Lizzie," Mrs. Carbuncle said, "the dear girl won't have an ounce more
than she would have got, had you gone into another sort of shop with
thirty-five sovereigns in your hand." Lizzie growled, but Mrs. Carbuncle's
final argument was conclusive. "I'll tell you what we'll do," said she;
"we'll take thirty pounds down in ready money." There was no answer to be
made to so reasonable a proposition.

The presents to be made to Lucinda were very much thought of in Hertford
Street at this time, and Lizzie--independently of any feeling that she
might have as to her own contribution--did all she could to assist the
collection of tribute. It was quite understood that as a girl can be
married only once--for a widow's chance in such matters amounts to but
little--everything should be done to gather toll from the tax-payers of
society. It was quite fair on such an occasion that men should be given to
understand that something worth having was expected--no trumpery thirty-
shilling piece of crockery, no insignificant glass bottle, or fantastic
paper-knife of no real value whatever, but got up just to put money into
the tradesmen's hands. To one or two elderly gentlemen upon whom Mrs.
Carbuncle had smiled, she ventured to suggest in plain words that a check
was the most convenient _cadeau_. "What do you say to a couple of
sovereigns?" one sarcastic old gentleman replied, upon whom probably Mrs.
Carbuncle had not smiled enough. She laughed and congratulated her
sarcastic friend upon his joke--but the two sovereigns were left upon the
table, and went to swell the spoil.

"You must do something handsome for Lucinda," Lizzie said to her cousin.

"What do you call handsome?"

"You are a bachelor and a Member of Parliament. Say fifteen pounds."

"I'll be ---- if I do," said Frank, who was beginning to be very much
disgusted with the house in Hertford Street. "There's a five-pound note,
and you may do what you please with it." Lizzie gave over the five-pound
note--the identical bit of paper that had come from Frank; and Mrs.
Carbuncle, no doubt, did do what she pleased with it.

There was almost a quarrel because Lizzie, after much consideration,
declared that she did not see her way to get a present from the Duke of
Omnium. She had talked so much to Mrs. Carbuncle about the duke that Mrs.
Carbuncle was almost justified in making the demand.

"It isn't the value, you know," said Mrs. Carbuncle; "neither I nor
Lucinda would think of that; but it would look so well to have the dear
duke's name on something." Lizzie declared that the duke was
unapproachable on such subjects. "There you're wrong," said Mrs.
Carbuncle. "I happen to know there is nothing his grace likes so much as
giving wedding presents." This was the harder upon Lizzie as she actually
did succeed in saying such kind things about Lucinda that Lady Glencora
sent Miss Roanoke the prettiest smelling-bottle in the world.

"You don't mean to say you've given a present to the future Lady Tewett?"
said Madame Max Goesler to her friend.

"Why not? Sir Griffin can't hurt me. When one begins to be good-natured
why shouldn't one be good-natured all round?" Madame Max remarked that it
might perhaps be preferable to put an end to good-nature altogether.
"There I dare say you're right, my dear," said Lady Glencora. "I've long
felt that making presents means nothing. Only if one has a lot of money
and people like it, why shouldn't one? I've made so many to people I
hardly ever saw, that one more to Lady Tewett can't hurt."

Perhaps the most wonderful affair in that campaign was the spirited attack
which Mrs. Carbuncle made on a certain Mrs. Hanbury Smith, who for the
last six or seven years had not been among Mrs. Carbuncle's more intimate
friends. Mrs. Hanbury Smith lived with her husband in Paris, but before
her marriage had known Mrs. Carbuncle in London. Her father, Mr. Bunbury
Jones, had from certain causes chosen to show certain civilities to Mrs.
Carbuncle just at the period of his daughter's marriage, and Mrs.
Carbuncle, being perhaps at that moment well supplied with ready money,
had presented a marriage present. From that to this present day Mrs.
Carbuncle had seen nothing of Mrs. Hanbury Smith nor of Mr. Bunbury Jones,
but she was not the woman to waste the return value of such a transaction.
A present so given was seed sown in the earth--seed, indeed, that could
not be expected to give back twenty-fold, or even ten-fold, but still seed
from which a crop should be expected. So she wrote to Mrs. Hanbury Smith
explaining that her darling niece Lucinda was about to be married to Sir
Griffin Tewett, and that, as she had no child of her own, Lucinda was the
same to her as a daughter. And then, lest there might be any want of
comprehension, she expressed her own assurance that her friend would be
glad to have an opportunity of reciprocating the feelings which had been
evinced on the occasion of her own marriage. "It is no good mincing
matters nowadays," Mrs. Carbuncle would have said, had any friend pointed
out to her that she was taking strong measures in the exaction of toll.
"People have come to understand that a spade is a spade, and £10 £10," she
would have said. Had Mrs. Hanbury Smith not noticed the application, there
might perhaps have been an end of it, but she was silly enough to send
over from Paris a little trumpery bit of finery, bought in the Palais
Royal for ten francs. Whereupon Mrs. Carbuncle wrote the following letter:

"DEAR MRS. HANBURY SMITH: Lucinda has received your little brooch, and is
much obliged to you for thinking of her; but you must remember that when
you were married I sent you a bracelet which cost £10. If I had a daughter
of my own I should, of course, expect that she would reap the benefit of
this on her marriage, and my niece is the same to me as a daughter. I
think that this is quite understood now among people in society. Lucinda
will be disappointed much if you do not send her what she thinks she has a
right to expect. Of course you can deduct the brooch if you please.

"Yours, very sincerely,

"JANE CARBUNCLE."

Mr. Hanbury Smith was something of a wag, and caused his wife to write
back as follows:

"DEAR MRS. CARBUNCLE: I quite acknowledge the reciprocity system, but
don't think it extends to descendants, certainly not to nieces. I
acknowledge, too, the present quoted at £10. I thought it had been £7
10_s._"--"The nasty, mean creature," said Mrs. Carbuncle, when showing the
correspondence to Lizzie, "must have been to the tradesman to inquire! The
price named was £10, but I got £2 10_s._ off for ready money."--"At your
second marriage I will do what is needful; but I can assure you I haven't
recognised nieces with any of my friends.

"Yours, very truly,

"CAROLINE HANBURY SMITH."

The correspondence was carried no further, for not even can a Mrs.
Carbuncle exact payment of such a debt in any established court; but she
inveighed bitterly against the meanness of Mrs. Smith, telling the story
openly, and never feeling that she had told it against herself. In her set
it was generally thought that she had done quite right.

She managed better with old Mr. Cabob, who had certainly received many of
Mrs. Carbuncle's smiles, and who was very rich. Mr. Cabob did as he was
desired, and sent a check--a check for £20; and added a message that he
hoped Miss Roanoke would buy with it some little thing that she liked.
Miss Roanoke, or her aunt for her, liked a thirty guinea ring, and bought
it, having the bill for the balance sent up to Mr. Cabob. Mr. Cabob, who
probably knew that he must pay well for his smiles, never said anything
about it.

Lady Eustace went into all this work, absolutely liking it. She had felt
nothing of anger even as regarded her own contribution, much as she had
struggled to reduce the amount. People, she felt, ought to be sharp; and
it was nice to look at pretty things, and to be cunning about them. She
would have applied to the Duke of Omnium had she dared, and was very
triumphant when she got the smelling-bottle from Lady Glencora. But
Lucinda herself took no part whatever in all these things. Nothing that
Mrs. Carbuncle could say would induce her to take any interest in them, or
even in the trousseau, which, without reference to expense, was being
supplied chiefly on the very indifferent credit of Sir Griffin. What
Lucinda had to say about the matter was said solely to her aunt. Neither
Lady Eustace, nor Lord George, nor even the maid who dressed her, heard
any of her complaints. But complain she did, and that with terrible
energy.

"What is the use of it, Aunt Jane? I shall never have a house to put them
into."

"What nonsense, my dear! Why shouldn't you have a house as well as
others?"

"And if I had, I should never care for them. I hate them. What does Lady
Glencora Palliser or Lord Fawn care for me?" Even Lord Fawn had been put
under requisition, and had sent a little box full of stationery.

"They are worth money, Lucinda; and when a girl marries she always gets
them."

"Yes; and when they come from people who love her, and who pour them into
her lap with kisses, because she has given herself to a man she loves,
then it must be nice. Oh, if I were marrying a poor man, and a poor friend
had given me a gridiron to help me to cook my husband's dinner, how I
could have valued it!"

"I don't know that you like poor things and poor people better than
anybody else," said Aunt Jane.

"I don't like anything or anybody," said Lucinda.

"You had better take the good things that come to you, then; and not
grumble. How I have worked to get all this arranged for you, and now what
thanks have I?"

"You'll find you have worked for very little, Aunt Jane. I shall never
marry the man yet." This, however, had been said so often that Aunt Jane
thought nothing of the threat.




CHAPTER LXVI

THE ASPIRATIONS OF MR. EMILIUS


It was acknowledged by Mrs. Carbuncle very freely that in the matter of
tribute no one behaved better than Mr. Emilius, the fashionable, foreign,
ci-devant Jew preacher, who still drew great congregations in the
neighbourhood of Mrs. Carbuncle's house. Mrs. Carbuncle, no doubt,
attended regularly at Mr. Emilius's church, and had taken a sitting for
thirteen Sundays at something like ten shillings a Sunday. But she had not
as yet paid the money, and Mr. Emilius was well aware that if his tickets
were not paid for in advance, there would be considerable defalcations in
his income. He was, as a rule, very particular as to such payments, and
would not allow a name to be put on a sitting till the money had reached
his pockets; but with Mrs. Carbuncle he had descended to no such
commercial accuracy. Mrs. Carbuncle had seats for three--for one of which
Lady Eustace paid her share in advance--in the midst of the very best pews
in the most conspicuous part of the house, and hardly a word had been said
to her about the money. And now there came to them from Mr. Emilius the
prettiest little gold salver that ever was seen.

"I send Messrs. Clerico's docket," wrote Mr. Emilius, "as Miss Roanoke may
like to know the quality of the metal."

"Ah," said Mrs. Carbuncle, inspecting the little dish and putting two and
two together; "he's got it cheap, no doubt, at the place where they
commissioned him to buy the plate and candlesticks for the church; but at
£3 16s. 3d. the gold is worth nearly twenty pounds." Mr. Emilius no doubt
had had his outing in the autumn through the instrumentality of Mrs.
Carbuncle's kindness; but that was past and gone, and such lavish
gratitude for a past favour could hardly be expected from Mr. Emilius.
"I'll be hanged if he isn't after Portray Castle," said Mrs. Carbuncle to
herself.

Poor Emilius was after Portray Castle and had been after Portray Castle in
a silent, not very confident, but yet not altogether hopeless manner ever
since he had seen the glories of that place and learned something of truth
as to the widow's income. Mrs. Carbuncle was led to her conclusion not
simply by the wedding present, but in part also by the diligence displayed
by Mr. Emilius in removing the doubts which had got abroad respecting his
condition in life. He assured Mrs. Carbuncle that he had never been
married. Shortly after his ordination, which had been effected under the
hands of that great and good man the late Bishop of Jerusalem, he had
taken to live with him a lady who was--Mrs. Carbuncle did not quite
recollect who the lady was, but remembered that she was connected in some
way with a step-mother of Mr. Emilius who lived in Bohemia. This lady had
for a while kept house for Mr. Emilius; but ill-natured things had been
said, and Mr. Emilius, having respect to his cloth, had sent the poor lady
back to Bohemia. The consequence was that he now lived in a solitude which
was absolute and, as Mr. Emilius added, somewhat melancholy. All this Mr.
Emilius explained very fully, not to Lizzie herself, but to Mrs.
Carbuncle. If Lady Eustace chose to entertain such a suitor, why should he
not come? It was nothing to Mrs. Carbuncle.

Lizzie laughed when she was told that she might add the reverend gentleman
to the list of her admirers.

"Don't you remember," she said, "how we used to chaff Miss Macnulty about
him?"

"I knew better than that," replied Mrs. Carbuncle.

"There is no saying what a man may be after," said Lizzie. "I didn't know
but what he might have thought that Macnulty's connection would increase
his congregation."

"He's after you, my dear, and your income. He can manage a congregation
for himself."

Lizzie was very civil to him, but it would be unjust to her to say that
she gave him any encouragement. It is quite the proper thing for a lady to
be on intimate, and even on affectionate, terms with her favourite
clergyman, and Lizzie certainly had intercourse with no clergyman who was
a greater favourite with her than Mr. Emilius. She had a dean for an
uncle, and a bishop for an uncle-in-law; but she was at no pains to hide
her contempt for these old fogies of the church.

"They preach now and then in the cathedral," she said to Mr. Emilius, "and
everybody takes the opportunity of going to sleep." Mr. Emilius was very
much amused at this description of the eloquence of the dignitaries. It
was quite natural to him that people should go to sleep in church who take
no trouble in seeking eloquent preachers.

"Ah," he said, "the church in England, which is my church, the church
which I love, is beautiful. She is as a maiden, all glorious with fine
raiment. But, alas, she is mute. She does not sing. She has no melody. But
the time cometh in which she shall sing. I, myself, I am a poor singer in
the great choir." In saying which Mr. Emilius no doubt intended to allude
to his eloquence as a preacher.

He was a man who could listen as well as sing, and he was very careful to
hear well that which was being said in public about Lady Eustace and her
diamonds. He had learned thoroughly what was her condition in reference to
the Portray estate, and was rejoiced rather than otherwise to find that
she enjoyed only a life-interest in the property. Had the thing been
better than it was, it would have been the further removed from his reach.
And in the same way, when rumours reached him prejudicial to Lizzie in
respect of the diamonds, he perceived that such prejudice might work weal
for him. A gentleman once, on ordering a mackerel that would come to a
shilling, found he could have a stale mackerel for sixpence. "Then bring
me a stale mackerel," said the gentleman. Mr. Emilius coveted fish, but
was aware that his position did not justify him in expecting the best fish
in the market. The Lord Fawns and the Frank Greystocks of the world would
be less likely to covet Lizzie, should she by any little indiscretion have
placed herself under a temporary cloud. Mr. Emilius had carefully observed
the heavens, and knew how quickly such clouds will disperse themselves
when they are tinged with gold. There was nothing which Lizzie had done,
or would be likely to do, which could materially affect her income. It
might indeed be possible that the Eustaces should make her pay for the
necklace; but even in that case there would be quite enough left for that
modest, unambitious comfort which Mr. Emilius desired. It was by
preaching, and not by wealth, that he must make himself known in the
world! but for a preacher to have a pretty wife with a title and a good
income, and a castle in Scotland, what an Elysium it would be! In such a
condition he would envy no dean, no bishop, no archbishop! He thought a
great deal about it, and saw no positive bar to his success.

She told him that she was going to Scotland.

"Not immediately!" he exclaimed.

"My little boy is there," she said.

"But why should not your little boy be here? Surely for people who can
choose, the great centre of the world offers attractions which cannot be
found in secluded spots."

"I love seclusion," said Lizzie with rapture.

"Ah, yes; I can believe that." Mr. Emilius had himself witnessed the
seclusion of Portray Castle, and had heard, when there, many stories of
the Ayrshire hunting. "It is your nature--but, dear Lady Eustace, will you
allow me to say that our nature is implanted in us in accordance with the
Fall?"

"Do you mean to say that it is wicked to like to be in Scotland better
than in this giddy town?"

"I say nothing about wicked, Lady Eustace; but this I do say, that nature
alone will not lead us always aright. It is good to be at Portray part of
the year, no doubt; but are there not blessings in such a congregation of
humanity as this London which you cannot find at Portray?"

"I can hear you preach, Mr. Emilius, certainly."

"I hope that is something, too, Lady Eustace; otherwise a great many
people who kindly come to hear me must sadly waste their time. And your
example to the world around; is it not more serviceable amidst the crowds
of London than in the solitudes of Scotland? There is more good to be
done, Lady Eustace, by living among our fellow creatures than by deserting
them. Therefore I think you should not go to Scotland before August, but
should have your little boy brought to you here."

"The air of his native mountains is everything to my child," said Lizzie.
The child had in fact been born at Bobsborough, but that probably would
make no real difference.

"You cannot wonder that I should plead for your stay," said Mr. Emilius,
throwing all his soul into his eyes. "How dark would everything be to me
if I missed you from your seat in the house of praise and prayer!"

Lizzie Eustace, like some other ladies who ought to be more appreciative,
was altogether deficient in what may perhaps be called good taste in
reference to men. Though she was clever, and though in spite of her
ignorance she at once knew an intelligent man from a fool, she did not
know the difference between a gentleman and a--"cad." It was in her
estimation something against Mr. Emilius that he was a clergyman,
something against him that he had nothing but what he earned, something
against him that he was supposed to be a renegade Jew, and that nobody
knew whence he came nor who he was. These deficiencies or drawbacks Lizzie
recognised. But it was nothing against him in her judgment that he was a
greasy, fawning, pawing, creeping, black-browed rascal, who could not look
her full in the face, and whose every word sounded like a lie. There was a
twang in his voice which ought to have told her that he was utterly
untrustworthy. There was an oily pretence at earnestness in his manner
which ought to have told that he was not fit to associate with gentlemen.
There was a foulness of demeanour about him which ought to have given to
her, as a woman at any rate brought up among ladies, an abhorrence of his
society. But all this Lizzie did not feel. She ridiculed to Mrs. Carbuncle
the idea of the preacher's courtship. She still thought that in the teeth
of all her misfortunes she could do better with herself than marry Mr.
Emilius. She conceived that the man must be impertinent if Mrs.
Carbuncle's assertion were true; but she was neither angry nor disgusted,
and she allowed him to talk to her, and even to make love to her, after
his nasty pseudo-clerical fashion.

She could surely still do better with herself than marry Mr. Emilius! It
was now the twentieth of March, and a fortnight had gone since an
intimation had been sent to her from the headquarters of the police that
Patience Crabstick was in their hands. Nothing further had occurred, and
it might be that Patience Crabstick had told no tale against her. She
could not bring herself to believe that Patience had no tale to tell, but
it might be that Patience, though she was in the hands of the police,
would find it to her interest to tell no tale against her late mistress.
At any rate there was silence and quiet, and the affair of the diamonds
seemed almost to be passing out of people's minds. Greystock had twice
called in Scotland Yard, but had been able to learn nothing. It was
feared, they said, that the people really engaged in the robbery had got
away scot-free. Frank did not quite believe them, but he could learn
nothing from them. Thus encouraged, Lizzie determined that she would
remain in London till after Lucinda's marriage, till after she should have
received the promised letter from Lord Fawn, as to which, though it was so
long in coming, she did not doubt that it would come at last. She could do
nothing with Frank, who was a fool! She could do nothing with Lord George,
who was a brute! Lord Fawn would still be within her reach, if only the
secret about the diamonds could be kept a secret till after she should
have become his wife.

About this time Lucinda spoke to her respecting her proposed journey. "You
were talking of going to Scotland a week ago, Lady Eustace."

"And am still talking of it."

"Aunt Jane says that you are waiting for my wedding. It is very kind of
you, but pray don't do that."

"I shouldn't think of going now till after your marriage. It only wants
ten or twelve days."

"I count them. I know how many days it wants. It may want more than that."

"You can't put it off now, I should think," said Lizzie; "and as I have
ordered my dress for the occasion I shall certainly stay and wear it."

"I am very sorry for your dress. I am very sorry for it all. Do you know,
I sometimes think I shall--murder him."

"Lucinda, how can you say anything so horrible! But I see you are only
joking." There did come a ghastly smile over that beautiful face, which
was so seldom lighted up by any expression of mirth or good humour. "But I
wish you would not say such horrible things."

"It would serve him right; and if he were to murder me that would serve me
right. He knows that I detest him, and yet he goes on with it. I have told
him so a score of times, but nothing will make him give it up. It is not
that he loves me, but he thinks that that will be his triumph."

"Why don't you give it up if it makes you unhappy?"

"It ought to come from him, ought it not?"

"I don't see why," said Lizzie.

"He is not bound to anybody as I am bound to my aunt. No one can have
exacted an oath from him. Lady Eustace, you don't quite understand how we
are situated. I wonder whether you would take the trouble to be good to
me?"

Lucinda Roanoke had never asked a favour of her before; had never, to
Lizzie's knowledge, asked a favour of any one. "In what way can I be good
to you?" she said.

"Make him give it up. You may tell him what you like of me. Tell him that
I shall only make him miserable, and more despicable than he is; that I
shall never be a good wife to him. Tell him that I am thoroughly bad, and
that he will repent it to the last day of his life. Say whatever you like,
but make him give it up."

"When everything has been prepared!"

"What does all that signify compared to a life of misery? Lady Eustace, I
really think that I should--kill him, if he were--were my husband." Lizzie
at last said that she would at any rate speak to Sir Griffin.

And she did speak to Sir Griffin, having waited three or foui days to do
so. There had been some desperately sharp words between Sir Griffin and
Mrs. Carbuncle with reference to money. Sir Griffin had been given to
understand that Lucinda had, or would have, some few hundred pounds, and
insisted that the money should be handed over to him on the day of his
marriage. Mrs. Carbuncle had declared that the money was to come from
property to be realised in New York, and had named a day which had seemed
to Sir Griffin to be as the Greek Kalends. He expressed an opinion that he
was swindled, and Mrs. Carbuncle, unable to restrain herself, had turned
upon him full of wrath. He was caught by Lizzie as he was descending the
stairs, and in the dining-room he poured out the tale of his wrongs. "That
woman doesn't know what fair dealing means," said he.

"That's a little hard, Sir Griffin, isn't it?" said Lizzie.

"Not a bit. A trumpery six hundred pounds! And she hasn't a shilling of
fortune, and never will have, beyond that! No fellow ever was more
generous or more foolish than I have been." Lizzie, as she heard this,
could not refrain from thinking of the poor departed Sir Florian. "I
didn't look for fortune, or say a word about money, as almost every man
does, but just took her as she was. And now she tells me that I can't have
just the bit of money that I wanted for our tour. It would serve them both
right if I were to give it up."

"Why don't you?" said Lizzie. He looked quickly, sharply, and closely into
her face as she asked the question. "I would, if I thought as you do."

"And lay myself in for all manner of damages," said Sir Griffin.

"There wouldn't be anything of that kind, I'm sure. You see the truth is,
you and Miss Roanoke are always having--having little tiffs together. I
sometimes think you don't really care a bit for her."

"It's the old woman I'm complaining of," said Sir Griffin, "and I'm not
going to marry her. I shall have seen the last of her when I get out of
the church, Lady Eustace."

"Do you think she wishes it?"

"Who do you mean?" asked Sir Griffin.

"Why--Lucinda?"

"Of course she does. Where'd she be now if it wasn't to go on? I don't
believe they've money enough between them to pay the rent of the house
they're living in."

"Of course I don't want to make difficulties, Sir Griffin, and no doubt
the affair has gone very far now. But I really think Lucinda would consent
to break it off if you wish it. I have never thought that you were really
in love with her."

He again looked at her very sharply and very closely.

"Has she sent you to say all this?"

"Has who sent me? Mrs. Carbuncle didn't."

"But Lucinda?"

She paused a moment before she replied, but she could not bring herself to
be absolutely honest in the matter. "No; she didn't send me. But from what
I see and hear, I am quite sure she does not wish to go on with it."

"Then she shall go on with it," said Sir Griffin. "I'm not going to be
made a fool of in that way. She shall go on with it, and the first thing I
mean to tell her as my wife is, that she shall never see that woman again.
If she thinks she's going to be master, she's very much mistaken." Sir
Griffin, as he said this, showed his teeth, and declared his purpose to be
masterful by his features as well as by his words; but Lady Eustace was
nevertheless of opinion that when the two came to an absolute struggle for
mastery, the lady would get the better of it.

Lizzie never told Miss Roanoke of her want of success, or even of the
effort she had made; nor did the unhappy young woman come to her for any
reply. The preparations went on, and it was quite understood that on this
peculiar occasion Mrs. Carbuncle intended to treat her friends with
profuse hospitality. She proposed to give a breakfast; and as the house in
Hertford Street was very small, rooms had been taken at a hotel in
Albemarle Street. Thither as the day of the marriage drew near, all the
presents were taken--so that they might be viewed by the guests, with the
names of the donors attached to them. As some of the money given had been
very much wanted indeed, so that the actual checks could not conveniently
be spared just at the moment to pay for the presents which ought to have
been bought, a few very pretty things were hired, as to which, when the
donors should see their names attached to them, they should surely think
that the money given had been laid out to great advantage.




CHAPTER LXVII

THE EYE OF THE PUBLIC


It took Lord Fawn a long time to write his letter, but at last he wrote
it. The delay must not be taken as throwing any slur on his character as a
correspondent or a man of business, for many irritating causes sprang up
sufficient to justify him in pleading that it arose from circumstances
beyond his own control. It is moreover felt by us all that the time which
may fairly be taken in the performance of any task depends, not on the
amount of work, but on the importance of it when done. A man is not
expected to write a check for a couple of thousand pounds as readily as he
would one for five, unless he be a man to whom a couple of thousand pounds
is a mere nothing. To Lord Fawn the writing of this letter was everything.
He had told Lizzie, with much exactness, what he would put into it. He
would again offer his hand--acknowledging himself bound to do so by his
former offer--but would give reasons why she should not accept it. If
anything should occur in the mean time which would in his opinion justify
him in again repudiating her, he would of course take advantage of such
circumstance. If asked, himself, what was his prevailing motive in all
that he did or intended to do, he would have declared that it was above
all things necessary that he should "put himself right in the eye of the
British public."

But he was not able to do this without interference from the judgment of
others. Both Mr. and Mrs. Hittaway interfered; and he could not prevent
himself from listening to them and believing them, though he would
contradict all they said, and snub all their theories. Frank Greystock
also continued to interfere, and Lady Glencora Palliser. Even John Eustace
had been worked upon to write to Lord Fawn, stating his opinion as trustee
for his late brother's property, that the Eustace family did not think
that there was ground of complaint against Lady Eustace in reference to
the diamonds which had been stolen. This was a terrible blow to Lord Fawn,
and had come no doubt from a general agreement among the Eustace faction--
including the bishop, John Eustace, and even Mr. Camperdown--that it would
be a good thing to get the widow married and placed under some decent
control.

Lady Glencora absolutely had the effrontery to ask him whether the
marriage was not going to take place, and when a day would be fixed. He
gathered up his courage to give her ladyship a rebuke. "My private affairs
do seem to be uncommonly interesting," he said.

"Why, yes, Lord Fawn," said Lady Glencora, whom nothing could abash, "most
interesting. You see, dear Lady Eustace is so very popular that we all
want to know what is to be her fate."

"I regret to say that I cannot answer your ladyship's question with any
precision," said Lord Fawn.

But the Hittaway persecution was by far the worst. "You have seen her,
Frederic," said his sister.

"Yes, I have."

"You have made her no promise?"

"My dear Clara, this is a matter in which I must use my own judgment."

"But the family, Frederic?"

"I do not think that any member of our family has a just right to complain
of my conduct since I have had the honour of being its head. I have
endeavoured so to live that my actions should encounter no private or
public censure. If I fail to meet with your approbation, I shall grieve;
but I cannot on that account act otherwise than in accordance with my own
judgment."

 Mrs. Hittaway knew her brother well, and was not afraid of him. "That's
all very well; and I am sure you know, Frederic, how proud we all are of
you. But this woman is a nasty, low, scheming, ill-conducted, dishonest
little wretch; and if you make her your wife you'll be miserable all your
life. Nothing would make me and Orlando so unhappy as to quarrel with you.
But we know that it is so, and to the last minute I shall say so. Why
don't you ask her to her face about that man down in Scotland?"

"My dear Clara, perhaps I know what to ask her and what not to ask her
better than you can tell me."

And his brother-in-law was quite as bad. "Fawn," he said, "in this matter
of Lady Eustace, don't you think you ought to put your conduct into the
hands of some friend?"

"What do you mean by that?"

"I think it is an affair in which a man would have so much comfort in
being able to say that he was guided by advice. Of course her people want
you to marry her. Now if you could just tell them that the whole thing was
in the hands of--say me, or any other friend, you would be relieved, you
know, of so much responsibility. They might hammer away at me ever so long
and I shouldn't care twopence."

"If there is to be any hammering, it cannot be borne vicariously," said
Lord Fawn, and as he said it he was quite pleased by his own sharpness and
wit.

He had indeed put himself beyond protection by vicarious endurance of
hammering when he promised to write to Lady Eustace, explaining his own
conduct and giving reasons. Had anything turned up in Scotland Yard which
would have justified him in saying, or even in thinking, that Lizzie had
stolen her own diamonds, he would have sent word to her that he must
abstain from any communication till that matter had been cleared up; but
since the appearance of that mysterious paragraph in the newspapers
nothing had been heard of the robbery, and public opinion certainly seemed
to be in favour of Lizzie's innocence. He did think that the Eustace
faction was betraying him, as he could not but remember how eager Mr.
Camperdown had been in asserting that the widow was keeping an enormous
amount of property and claiming it as her own, whereas in truth she had
not the slightest title to it. It was, in a great measure, in consequence
of the assertions of the Eustace faction, almost in obedience to their
advice, that he had resolved to break off the match; and now they turned
upon him, and John Eustace absolutely went out of his way to write him a
letter which was clearly meant to imply that he, Lord Fawn, was bound to
marry the woman to whom he had once engaged himself! Lord Fawn felt that
he was ill-used, and that a man might have to undergo a great deal of bad
treatment who should strive to put himself right in the eye of the public.

At last he wrote his letter--on a Wednesday, which with him had something
of the comfort of a half-holiday, as on that day he was not required to
attend Parliament.

"INDIA OFFICE, March 28, 18--.

"MY DEAR LADY EUSTACE: In accordance with the promise which I made to you
when I did myself the honour of waiting upon you in Hertford Street, I
take up my pen with the view of communicating to you the result of my
deliberations respecting the engagement of marriage which no doubt did
exist between us last summer.

"Since that time I have no doubt taken upon myself to say that that
engagement was over; and I am free to admit that I did so without any
assent or agreement on your part to that effect. Such conduct no doubt
requires a valid and strong defence. My defence is as follows:

"I learned that you were in possession of a large amount of property,
vested in diamonds, which was claimed by the executors under your late
husband's will as belonging to his estate; and as to which they declared,
in the most positive manner, that you had no right or title to it
whatever. I consulted friends and I consulted lawyers, and I was led to
the conviction that this property certainly did not belong to you. Had I
married you in these circumstances, I could not but have become a
participator in the lawsuit which I was assured would be commenced. I
could not be a participator with you, because I believed you to be in the
wrong. And I certainly could not participate with those who would in such
case be attacking my own wife.

"In this condition of things I requested you--as you must I think yourself
own, with all deference and good feeling--to give up the actual possession
of the property, and to place the diamonds in neutral hands"--Lord Fawn
was often called upon to be neutral in reference to the condition of
outlying Indian principalities--"till the law should have decided as to
their ownership. As regards myself, I neither coveted nor rejected the
possession of that wealth for my future wife. I desired simply to be free
from an embarrassment which would have overwhelmed me. You declined my
request--not only positively, but perhaps I may add peremptorily; and then
I was bound to adhere to the decision I had communicated to you.

"Since that time the property has been stolen and, as I believe,
dissipated. The lawsuit against you has been withdrawn; and the bone of
contention, so to say, is no longer existing. I am no longer justified in
declining to keep my engagement because of the prejudice to which I should
have been subjected by your possession of the diamonds; and therefore, as
far as that goes, I withdraw my withdrawal." This Lord Fawn thought was
rather a happy phrase, and he read it aloud to himself more than once.

"But now there arises the question whether, in both our interests, this
marriage should go on, or whether it may not be more conducive to your
happiness and to mine that it should be annulled for causes altogether
irrespective of the diamonds. In a matter so serious as marriage, the
happiness of the two parties is that which requires graver thought than
any other consideration.

"There has no doubt sprung up between us a feeling of mutual distrust,
which has led to recrimination, and which is hardly compatible with that
perfect confidence which should exist between a man and his wife. This
first arose no doubt from the different views which we took as to that
property of which I have spoken, and as to which your judgment may
possibly have been better than mine. On that head I will add nothing to
what I have already said; but the feeling has arisen, and I fear it cannot
be so perfectly allayed as to admit of that reciprocal trust without which
we could not live happily together. I confess that for my own part I do
not now desire a union which was once the great object of my ambition, and
that I could not go to the altar with you without fear and trembling. As
to your own feelings, you best know what they are. I bring no charge
against you; but if you have ceased to love me I think you should cease to
wish to be my wife, and that you should not insist upon a marriage simply
because by doing so you would triumph over a former objection. "Before he
finished this paragraph he thought much of Andy Gowran and of the scene
among the rocks of which he had heard. But he could not speak of it. He
had found himself unable to examine the witness who had been brought to
him, and had honestly told himself that he could not take that charge as
proved. Andy Gowran might have lied. In his heart he believed that Andy
Gowran had lied. The matter was distasteful to him, and he would not touch
it. And yet he knew that the woman did not love him, and he longed to tell
her so.

"As to what we might each gain or each lose in a worldly point of view,
either by marrying or not marrying, I will not say a word. You have rank
and wealth, and therefore I can comfort myself by thinking that if I
dissuade you from this marriage I shall rob you of neither. I acknowledge
that I wish to dissuade you, as I believe that we should not make each
other happy. As however I do consider that I am bound to keep my
engagement to you if you demand that I shall do so, I leave the matter in
your hands for decision. I am, and shall remain, your sincere friend,

"FAWN."

He read the letter and copied it, and gave himself great credit for the
composition. He thought that it was impossible that any woman after
reading it should express a wish to become the wife of the man who wrote
it; and yet--so he believed, no man or woman could find fault with him for
writing it. There certainly was one view of the case which was very
distressing. How would it be with him if after all she should say that she
would marry him? After having given her her choice--having put it all in
writing--he could not again go back from it. He would be in her power, and
of what use would his life be to him? Would Parliament or the India Office
or the eye of the public be able to comfort him then in the midst of his
many miseries? What could he do with a wife whom he married with a
declaration that he disliked her? With such feelings as were his, how
could he stand before a clergyman and take an oath that he would love her
and cherish her? Would she not ever be as an adder to him--as an adder
whom it would be impossible that he should admit into his bosom? Could he
live in the same house with her; and if so, could he ask his mother and
sisters to visit her? He remembered well what Mrs. Hittaway had called
her--a nasty, low, scheming, ill-conducted, dishonest little wretch! And
he believed that she was so! Yet he was once again offering to marry her,
should she choose to accept him.

Nevertheless, the letter was sent. There was, in truth, no alternative. He
had promised that he would write such a letter, and all that had remained
to him was the power of cramming into it every available argument against
the marriage. This he had done and, as he thought, had done well. It was
impossible that she should desire to marry him after reading such a letter
as that!

Lizzie received it in her bedroom, where she breakfasted, and told of its
arrival to her friend Mrs. Carbuncle as soon as they met each other. "My
lord has come down from his high horse at last," she said, with the letter
in her hand.

"What--Lord Fawn?"

"Yes; Lord Fawn. What other lord? There is no other lord for me. He is my
lord, my peer of Parliament, my Cabinet minister, my right honourable, my
member of the Government--my young man too, as the maid-servants call
them."

"What does he say?"

"Say--what should he say--just that he has behaved very badly, and that he
hopes I shall forgive him."

"Not quite that; does he?"

"That's what it all means. Of course there is ever so much of it--pages of
it. It wouldn't be Lord Fawn if he didn't spin it all out, like an act of
Parliament, with whereas and whereis and whereof. It is full of all that;
but the meaning of it is that he's at my feet again, and that I may pick
him up if I choose to take him. I'd show you the letter, only perhaps it
wouldn't be fair to the poor man."

"What excuse does he make?"

"Oh--as to that he's rational enough. He calls the necklace the--bone of
contention. That's rather good for Lord Fawn; isn't it? The bone of
contention, he says, has been removed; and therefore there is no reason
why we shouldn't marry if we like it. He shall hear enough about the bone
of contention if we do 'marry.'"

"And what shall you do now?"

"Ah, yes; that's easily asked, is it not? The man's a good sort of man in
his way, you know. He doesn't drink or gamble, and I don't think there is
a bit of the King David about him--that I don't."

"Virtue personified, I should say."

"And he isn't extravagant."

"Then why not have him and done with it?" asked Mrs. Carbuncle.

"He is such a lumpy man," said Lizzie; "such an ass; such a load of
government waste paper."

"Come, my dear; you've had troubles."

"I have indeed," said Lizzie.

"And there's no quite knowing yet how far they're over."

"What do you mean by that, Mrs. Carbuncle?"

"Nothing very much; but still, you see, they may come again. As to Lord
George, we all know that he has not got a penny-piece in the world that he
can call his own."

"If he had as many pennies as Judas, Lord George would be nothing to me,"
said Lizzie.

"And your cousin really doesn't seem to mean anything."

"I know very well what my cousin means. He and I understand each other
thoroughly; but cousins can love one another very well without marrying."

"Of course you know your own business, but if I were you I would take Lord
Fawn. I speak in true kindness, as one woman to another. After all, what
does love signify? How much real love do we ever see among married people?
Does Lady Glencora Palliser really love her husband, who thinks of nothing
in the world but putting taxes on and off?"

"Do you love your husband, Mrs. Carbuncle?"

"No; but that is a different kind of thing. Circumstances have caused me
to live apart from him. The man is a good man, and there is no reason why
you should not respect him and treat him well. He will give you a fixed
position, which really you want badly, Lady Eustace."

"Torriloo, tooriloo, tooriloo, looriloo," said Lizzie, in contemptuous
disdain of her friend's caution..

"And then all this trouble about the diamonds and the robberies will be
over," continued Mrs. Carbuncle. Lizzie looked at her very intently. What
should make Mrs. Carbuncle suppose that there need be, or indeed could be,
any further trouble about the diamonds?

"So, that's your advice," said Lizzie, "I'm half inclined to take it, and
perhaps I shall. However, I have brought him round, and that's something,
my dear. And either one way or the other, I shall let him know that I like
my triumph. I was determined to have it, and I've got it." Then she read
the letter again very seriously. Could she possibly marry a man who in so
many words told her that he didn't want her? Well, she thought she could.
Was not everybody treating everybody else much in the same way? Had she
not loved her Corsair truly, and how had he treated her? Had she not been
true, disinterested, and most affectionate to Frank Greystock; and what
had she got from him? To manage her business wisely, and put herself upon
firm ground, that was her duty at present. Mrs. Carbuncle was right,
there. The very name of Lady Fawn would be a rock to her, and she wanted a
rock. She thought upon the whole that she could marry him--unless Patience
Crabstick and the police should again interfere with her prosperity.




CHAPTER LXVIII

THE MAJOR


Lady Eustace did not intend to take as much time in answering Loyd Fawn's
letter as he had taken in writing it; but even she found that the subject
was one which demanded a good deal of thought. Mrs. Carbuncle had very
freely recommended her to take the man, supporting her advice by arguments
which Lizzie felt to be valid; but then Mrs. Carbuncle did not know all
the circumstances. Mrs. Carbuncle had not actually seen his lordship's
letter; and though the great part of the letter, the formal repetition,
namely, of the writer's offer of marriage, had been truly told to her,
still, as the reader will have perceived, she had been kept in the dark as
to some of the details. Lizzie did sit at her desk with the object of
putting a few words together in order that she might see how they looked,
and she found that there was a difficulty.

"MY DEAR LORD FAWN: As we have been engaged to marry each other, and as
all our friends have been told, I think that the thing had better go on."

That, after various attempts, was, she thought, the best letter that she
could send--if she should make up her mind to be Lady Fawn. But, on the
morning of the 30th of March she had not sent her letter. She had told
herself that she would take two days to think of her reply, and on the
Friday morning the few words she had prepared were still lying in her
desk.

What was she to get by marrying a man she absolutely disliked? That he
also absolutely disliked her was not a matter much in her thoughts. The
man would not ill-treat her because he disliked her; or it might perhaps
be juster to say that the ill-treatment which she might fairly anticipate
would not be of a nature which would much affect her comfort grievously.
He would not beat her, nor rob her, nor lock her up, nor starve her. He
would either neglect her or preach sermons to her. For the first she could
console herself by the attention of others; and should he preach, perhaps
she could preach too--as sharply if not as lengthily as his lordship. At
any rate she was not afraid of him. But what would she gain? It is very
well to have a rock, as Mrs. Carbuncle had said, but a rock is not
everything. She did not know whether she cared much for living upon a
rock. Even stability may be purchased at too high a price. There was not a
grain of poetry in the whole composition of Lord Fawn, and poetry was what
her very soul craved--poetry, together with houses, champagne, jewels, and
admiration. Her income was still her own, and she did not quite see that
the rock was so absolutely necessary to her. Then she wrote another note
to Lord Fawn, a specimen of a note, so that she might have the opportunity
of comparing the two. This note took her much longer than the one first
written.

"MY LORD: I do not know how to acknowledge with sufficient humility the
condescension and great kindness of your lordship's letter. But perhaps
its manly generosity is more conspicuous than either. The truth is, my
lord, you want to escape from your engagement, but are too much afraid of
the consequences to dare to do so by any act of your own. Therefore you
throw it upon me. You are quite successful. I don't think you ever read
poetry, but perhaps you may understand the two following lines:

  "'I am constrained to say your lordship's scullion
  Should sooner be my husband than yourself.'

"I see through you, and despise you thoroughly.

"E. EUSTACE."

She was comparing the two answers together, very much in doubt as to which
should be sent, when there came a message to her by a man whom she knew to
be a policeman, though he did not announce himself as such, and was
dressed in plain clothes. Major Mackintosh sent his compliments to her,
and would wait, upon her that afternoon at three o'clock, if she would
have the kindness to receive him. At the first moment of seeing the man
she felt that after all the rock was what she wanted. Mrs. Carbuncle was
right. She had had troubles and might have more, and the rock was the
thing. But then the more certainly did she become convinced of this by the
presence of the major's messenger, the more clearly did she see the
difficulty of attaining the security which the rock offered. If this
public exposure should fall upon her, Lord Fawn's renewed offer, as she
knew well, would stand for nothing. If once it were known that she had
kept the necklace--her own necklace--under her pillow at Carlisle, he
would want no further justification in repudiating her, were it for the
tenth time. She was very uncivil to the messenger, and the more so because
she found that the man bore her rudeness without turning upon her and
rending her. When she declared that the police had behaved very badly, and
that Major Mackintosh was inexcusable in troubling her again, and that she
had ceased to care twopence about the necklace, the man made no
remonstrance to her petulance. He owned that the trouble was very great,
and the police very inefficient. He almost owned that the major was
inexcusable. He did not care what he owned so that he achieved his object.
But when Lizzie said that she could not see Major Mackintosh at three, and
objected equally to two, four, or five; then the courteous messenger from
Scotland Yard did say a word to make her understand that there must be a
meeting--and he hinted also that the major was doing a most unusually
good-natured thing in coming to Hertford Street. Of course Lizzie made the
appointment. If the major chose to come, she would be at home at three.

As soon as the policeman was gone she sat alone, with a manner very much
changed from that which she had worn since the arrival of Lord Fawn's
letter; with a fresh weight of care upon her, greater perhaps than she had
ever hitherto borne. She had had bad moments--when, for instance, she had
been taken before the magistrates at Carlisle, when she found the police
in her house on her return from the theatre, and when Lord George had
forced her secret from her. But at each of these periods hope had come
renewed before despair had crushed her. Now it seemed to her that the
thing was done and that the game was over. This chief man of the London
police no doubt knew the whole story. If she could only already have
climbed upon some rock, so that there might be a man bound to defend her--
a man at any rate bound to put himself forward on her behalf and do
whatever might be done in her defence--she might have endured it!

What would she do now, at this minute? She looked at her watch and found
that it was already past one. Mrs. Carbuncle, as she knew, was closeted
up-stairs with Lucinda, whose wedding was fixed for the following Monday.
It was now Friday. Were she to call upon Mrs. Carbuncle for aid no aid
would be forthcoming unless she were to tell the whole truth. She almost
thought that she would do so. But then, how great would have been her
indiscretion if, after all, when the major should come, she should
discover that he did not know the truth himself! That Mrs. Carbuncle would
keep her secret she did not for a moment think. She longed for the comfort
of some friend's counsel, but she found at last that she could not
purchase it by telling everything to a woman.

Might it not be possible that she should still run away? She did not know
much of the law, but she thought that they could not punish her for
breaking an appointment even with a man so high in authority as Major
Mackintosh. She could leave a note saying that pressing business called
her out. But whither should she go? She thought of taking a cab to the
House of Commons, finding her cousin, and telling him everything. It would
be so much better that he should see the major. But then again it might be
that she should be mistaken as to the amount of the major's information.
After a while she almost determined to fly off at once to Scotland,
leaving word that she was obliged to go instantly to her child. But there
was no direct train to Scotland before eight or nine in the evening, and
during the intervening hours the police would have ample time to find her.
What, indeed, could she do with herself during these intervening hours?
Ah, if she had but a rock now, so that she need not be dependent
altogether on the exercise of her own intellect!

Gradually the minutes passed by, and she became aware that she must face
the major. Well! What had she done? She had stolen nothing. She had taken
no person's property. She had, indeed, been wickedly robbed, and the
police had done nothing to get back for her her property, as they were
bound to have done. She would take care to tell the major what she thought
about the negligence of the police. The major should not have the talk all
to himself.

If it had not been for one word with which Lord George had stunned her
ears, she could still have borne it well. She had told a lie; perhaps two
or three lies. She knew that she had lied. But then people lie every day.
She would not have minded it much if she were simply to be called a liar.
But he had told her that she would be accused of perjury. There was
something frightful to her in the name. And there were she knew not what
dreadful penalties attached to it. Lord George had told her that she might
be put in prison--whether he had said for years or for months she had
forgotten. And she thought she had heard of people's property being
confiscated to the Crown when they had been made out to be guilty of
certain great offences. Oh, how she wished that she had a rock!

When three o'clock came she had not started for Scotland or elsewhere, and
at last she received the major. Could she have thoroughly trusted the
servant she would have denied herself at the last moment, but she feared
that she might be betrayed, and she thought that her position would be
rendered even worse than it was at present by a futile attempt. She was
sitting alone, pale, haggard, trembling, when Major Mackintosh was shown
into her room. It may be as well explained at once, at this moment; the
major knew, or thought that he knew, every circumstance of the two
robberies, and that his surmises were, in every respect, right. Miss
Crabstick and Mr. Cann were in comfortable quarters, and were prepared to
tell all that they could tell. Mr. Smiler was in durance, and Mr. Benjamin
was at Vienna, in the hands of the Austrian police, who were prepared to
give him up to those who desired his society in England, on the completion
of certain legal formalities. That Mr. Benjamin and Mr. Smiler would be
prosecuted, the latter for the robbery and the former for conspiracy to
rob, and for receiving stolen goods, was a matter of course. But what was
to be done with Lady Eustace? That, at the present moment, was the
prevailing trouble with the police. During the last three weeks every
precaution had been taken to keep the matter secret, and it is hardly too
much to say that Lizzie's interests were handled not only with
consideration but with tenderness.

"Lady Eustace," said the major, "I am very sorry to trouble you. No doubt
the man who called on you this morning explained to you who I am."

"Oh yes, I know who you are--quite well." Lizzie made a great effort to
speak without betraying her consternation; but she was nearly prostrated.
The major, however, hardly observed her, and was by no means at ease
himself in his effort to save her from unnecessary annoyance. He was a
tall, thin, gaunt man of about forty, with large, good-natured eyes--but
it was not till the interview was half over that Lizzie took courage to
look even into his face.

"Just so; I am come, you know, about the robbery which took place here-and
the other robbery at Carlisle."

"I have been so troubled about these horrid robberies! Sometimes I think
they'll be the death of me."

"I think, Lady Eustace, we have found out the whole truth."

"Oh, I daresay. I wonder why--you have been so long--finding it out."

"We have had very clever people to deal with, Lady Eustace--and I fear
that, even now, we shall never get back the property."

"I do not care about the property, sir--although it was all my own. Nobody
has lost anything but myself; and I really don't see why the thing should
not die out, as I don't care about it. Whoever it is, they may have it
now."

"We were bound to get to the bottom of it all, if we could; and I think
that we have--at last. Perhaps, as you say, we ought to have done it
sooner."

"Oh--I don't care."

"We have two persons in custody, Lady Eustace, whom we shall use as
witnesses, and I am afraid we shall have to call upon you also--as a
witness." It occurred to Lizzie that they could not lock her up in prison
and make her a witness too, but she said nothing. Then the major continued
his speech--and asked her the question which was, in fact, alone material.
"Of course, Lady Eustace, you are not bound to say anything to me unless
you like--and you must understand that I by no means wish you to criminate
yourself."

"I don't know what that means."

"If you yourself have done anything wrong, I don't want to ask you to
confess it."

"I have had all my diamonds stolen, if you mean that. Perhaps it was wrong
to have diamonds."

"But to come to my question--I suppose we may take it for granted that the
diamonds were in your desk when the thieves made their entrance into this
house, and broke the desk open, and stole the money out of it?" Lizzie
breathed so hardly, that she was quite unable to speak. The man's voice
was very gentle and very kind--but then how could she admit that one fact?
All depended on that one fact. "The woman Crabstick," said the major, "has
confessed, and will state on her oath that she saw the necklace in your
hands in Hertford Street, and that she saw it placed in the desk. She then
gave information of this to Benjamin--as she had before given information
as to your journey up from Scotland--and she was introduced to the two men
whom she let into the house. One of them, indeed, who will also give
evidence for us, she had before met at Carlisle. She then was present when
the necklace was taken out of the desk. The man who opened the desk and
took it out, who also cut the door at Carlisle, will give evidence to the
same effect. The man who carried the necklace out of the house, and who
broke open the box at Carlisle, will be tried--as will also Benjamin, who
disposed of the diamonds. I have told you the whole story, as it has been
told to me by the woman Crabstick. Of course you will deny the truth of
it, if it be untrue." Lizzie sat with her eyes fixed upon the floor, but
said nothing. She could not speak. "If you will allow me, Lady Eustace, to
give you advice--really friendly advice----"

"Oh, pray do."

"You had better admit the truth of the story, if it is true."

"They were my own," she whispered.

"Or, at any rate, you believed that they were. There can be no doubt, I
think, as to that. No one supposes that the robbery at Carlisle was
arranged on your behalf."

"Oh, no."

"But you had taken them out of the box before you went to bed at the inn?"

"Not then."

"But you had taken them?"

"I did it in the morning before I started from Scotland. They frightened
me by saying the box would be stolen."

"Exactly--and then you put them into your desk here, in this house?"

"Yes--sir."

"I should tell you, Lady Eustace, that I had not a doubt about this before
I came here. For some time past I have thought that it must be so; and
latterly the confession of two of the accomplices has made it certain to
me. One of the housebreakers and the jeweller will be tried for the
felony, and I am afraid that you must undergo the annoyance of being one
of the witnesses."

"What will they do to me, Major Mackintosh?" Lizzie now for the first time
looked up into his eyes, and felt that they were kind. Could he be her
rock? He did not speak to her like an enemy--and then, too, he would know
better than any man alive how she might best escape from her trouble.

"They will ask you to tell the truth."

"Indeed I will do that," said Lizzie--not aware that, after so many lies,
it might be difficult to tell the truth.

"And you will probably be asked to repeat it, this way and that, in a
manner that will be troublesome to you. You see that here in London, and
at Carlisle, you have--given incorrect versions."

"I know I have. But the necklace was my own. There was nothing dishonest--
was there, Major Mackintosh? When they came to me at Carlisle I was so
confused that I hardly knew what to tell them. And when I had once--given
an incorrect version, you know, I didn't know how to go back."

The major was not so well acquainted with Lizzie as is the reader, and he
pitied her. "I can understand all that," he said.

How much kinder he was than Lord George had been when she confessed the
truth to him. Here would be a rock! And such a handsome man as he was,
too--not exactly a Corsair, as he was great in authority over the London
police--but a powerful, fine fellow, who would know what to do with swords
and pistols as well as any Corsair--and one, too, no doubt, who would
understand poetry! Any such dream, however, was altogether unavailing, as
the major had a wife at home and seven children. "If you will only tell me
what to do, I will do it," she said, looking up into his face with
entreaty, and pressing her hands together in supplication.

Then at great length, and with much patience, he explained to her what he
would have her do. He thought that, if she were summoned and used as a
witness, there would be no attempt to prosecute her for the--incorrect
versions--of which she had undoubtedly been guilty. The probability was,
that she would receive assurance to this effect before she would be asked
to give her evidence, preparatory to the committal of Benjamin and Smiler.
He could not assure her that it would be so, but he had no doubt of it. In
order, however, that things might be made to run as smooth as possible, he
recommended her very strongly to go at once to Mr. Camperdown and make a
clean breast of it to him. "The whole family should be told," said the
major, "and it will be better for you that they should know it from
yourself than from us." When she hesitated, he explained to her that the
matter could no longer be kept as a secret, and that her evidence would
certainly appear in the papers. He proposed that she should be summoned
for that day week--which would be the Friday after Lucinda's marriage--and
he suggested that she should go to Mr. Camperdown's on the morrow.

"What--to-morrow?" exclaimed Lizzie, in dismay.

"My dear Lady Eustace," said the major, "the sooner you get back into
straight running, the sooner you will be comfortable." Then she promised
that she would go on the Tuesday--the day after the marriage. "If he
learns it in the mean time, you must not be surprised," said the major.

"Tell me one thing, Major Mackintosh," she said, as she gave him her hand
at parting, "they can't take away from me anything that is my own--can
they?"

"I don't think they can," said the major, escaping rather quickly from the
room.




CHAPTER LXIX

"I CANNOT DO IT"


The Saturday and the Sunday Lizzie passed in outward tranquillity, though
doubtless her mind was greatly disturbed. She said nothing of what had
passed between her and Major Mackintosh, explaining that his visit had
been made solely with the object of informing her that Mr. Benjamin was to
be sent home from Vienna, but that the diamonds were gone forever. She
had, as she declared to herself, agreed with Major Mackintosh that she
would not go to Mr. Camperdown till the Tuesday--justifying her delay by
her solicitude in reference to Miss Roanoke's marriage; and therefore
these two days were her own. After them would come a totally altered phase
of existence. All the world would know the history of the diamonds--cousin
Frank, and Lord Fawn, and John Eustace, and Mrs. Carbuncle, and the
Bobsborough people, and Lady Glencora, and that old vulturess, her aunt,
the Countess of Linlithgow. It must come now--but she had two days in
which she could be quiet and think of her position. She would, she
thought, send one of her letters to Lord Fawn before she went to Mr.
Camperdown--but which should she send? Or should she write a third
explaining the whole matter in sweetly piteous feminine terms, and
swearing that the only remaining feeling in her bosom was a devoted
affection to the man who had now twice promised to be her husband?

In the mean time the preparations for the great marriage went on. Mrs.
Carbuncle spent her time busily between Lucinda's bedchamber and the
banqueting hall in Albemarle street. In spite of pecuniary difficulties
the trousseau was to be a wonder; and even Lizzie was astonished at the
jewelry which that indefatigable woman had collected together for a
preliminary show in Hertford Street. She had spent hours at Howell and
James's, and had made marvellous bargains there and elsewhere. Things were
sent for selection, of which the greater portion were to be returned, but
all were kept for the show. The same things which were shown to separate
friends in Hertford Street as part of the trousseau on Friday and Saturday
were carried over to Albemarle Street on the Sunday, so as to add to the
quasi-public exhibition of presents on the Monday. The money expended had
gone very far. The most had been made of a failing credit. Every particle
of friendly generosity had been so manipulated as to add to the external
magnificence. And Mrs. Carbuncle had done all this without any help from
Lucinda, in the midst of most contemptuous indifference on Lucinda's part.
She could hardly be got to allow the milliners to fit the dresses to her
body, and positively refused to thrust her feet into certain golden-heeled
boots with brightly-bronzed toes which were a great feature among the
raiment. Nobody knew it except Mrs. Carbuncle and the maid; even Lizzie
Eustace did not know it; but once the bride absolutely ran amuck among the
finery, scattering the laces here and there, pitching the glove-boxes
under the bed, chucking the golden-heeled boots into the fire-place, and
exhibiting quite a tempest of fury against one of the finest shows of
petticoats ever arranged with a view to the admiration and envy of female
friends. But all this Mrs. Carbuncle bore, and still persevered. The thing
was so nearly done now that she could endure to persevere though the
provocation to abandon it was so great. She had even ceased to find fault
with her niece, but went on in silence counting the hours till the trouble
should be taken off her own shoulders and placed on those of Sir Griffin.
It was a great thing to her, almost more than she had expected, that
neither Lucinda nor Sir Griffin should have positively declined the
marriage. It was impossible that either should retreat from it now.

Luckily for Mrs. Carbuncle, Sir Griffin took delight in the show. He did
this after a bearish fashion, putting his finger upon little flaws with an
intelligence for which Mrs. Carbuncle had not hitherto given him credit.
As to certain ornaments, he observed that the silver was plated and the
gold ormolu. A "rope" of pearls he at once detected as being false, and
after fingering certain lace he turned up his nose and shook his head.
Then, on the Sunday, in Albemarle Street, he pointed out to Mrs. Carbuncle
sundry articles which he had seen in the bedroom on the Saturday.

"But, my dear Sir Griffin, that's of course," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Oh; that's of course, is it?" said Sir Griffin turning up his nose again.
"Where did that Delft bowl come from?"

"It is one of Mortlook's finest Etruscan vases," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Oh, I thought that Etruscan vases came from--from somewhere in Greece or
Italy," said Sir Griffin.

"I declare that you are shocking," said Mrs. Carbuncle, struggling to
maintain her good-humour.

He passed hours of the Sunday in Hertford Street, and Lord George also was
there for some time. Lizzie, who could hardly devote her mind to the
affairs of the wedding, remained alone in her own sitting-room during the
greater part of the day; but she did show herself while Lord George was
there.

"So I hear that Mackintosh has been here," said Lord George.

"Yes, he was here."

"And what did he say?" Lizzie did not like the way in which the man looked
at her, feeling it to be not only unfriendly, but absolutely cruel. It
seemed to imply that he knew that her secret was about to be divulged. And
what was he to her now that he should be impertinent to her? What he knew,
all the world would know before the end of the week. And that other man
who knew it already, had been kind to her, had said nothing about perjury,
but had explained to her that what she would have to bear would be
trouble, and not imprisonment and loss of money. Lord George, to whom she
had been so civil, for whom she had spent money, to whom she had almost
offered herself and ail that she possessed--Lord George, whom she had
selected as the first repository of her secret, had spoken no word to
comfort her, but had made things look worse for her than they were. Why
should she submit to be questioned by Lord George? In a day or two the
secret which he knew would be no secret. "Never mind what he said, Lord
George," she replied.

"Has he found it all out?"

"You had better go and ask him yourself," said Lizzie. "I am sick of the
subject, and I mean to have done with it."

Lord George laughed, and Lizzie hated him for his laugh.

"I declare," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "that you two who were such friends are
always snapping at each other now."

"The fickleness is all on her ladyship's part, not on mine," said Lord
George; whereupon Lady Eustace walked out of the room and was not seen
again till dinner-time.

Soon afterwards Lucinda also endeavoured to escape, but to this Sir
Griffin objected. Sir Griffin was in a very good humour, and bore himself
like a prosperous bridegroom.

"Come, Luce," he said, "get off your high horse for a little. To-morrow,
you know, you must come down altogether."

"So much the more reason for my remaining up to-day."

"I'll be shot if you shall," said Sir Griffin. "Luce, sit in my lap, and
give me a kiss."

At this moment Lord George and Mrs. Carbuncle were in the front drawing-
room, and Lord George was telling her the true story as to the necklace.
It must be explained on his behalf that in doing this he did not consider
that he was betraying the trust reposed in him. "They know all about it in
Scotland Yard," he said; "I got it from Gager. They were bound to tell me
as, up to this week past, every man in the police thought that I had been
the master-mind among the thieves. When I think of it I hardly know
whether to laugh or cry."

"And she had them all the time?" exclaimed Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Yes; in this house! Did you ever hear of such a little cat? I could tell
you more than that. She wanted me to take them and dispose of them."

"No!"

"She did, though; and now see the way she treats me! Never mind. Don't say
a word to her about it till it comes out of itself. She'll have to be
arrested, no doubt."

"Arrested!" Mrs. Carbuncle's further exclamations were stopped by
Lucinda's struggles in the other room. She had declined to sit upon the
bridegroom's lap, but had acknowledged that she was bound to submit to be
kissed. He had kissed her, and then had striven to drag her onto his knee.
But she was strong, and had resisted violently, and, as he afterwards
said, had struck him savagely.

"Of course I struck him," said Lucinda.

"By ----, you shall pay for it," said Sir Griffin. This took place in the
presence of Lord George and Mrs. Carbuncle, and yet they were to be
married to-morrow.

"The idea of complaining that a girl hit you--and the girl who is to be
your wife!" said Lord George, as they walked off together.

"I know what to complain of, and what not," said Sir Griffin. "Are you
going to let me have that money?"

"No, I am not," said Lord George, "so there's an end of that."
Nevertheless, they dined together at their club afterwards, and in the
evening Sir Griffin was again in Hertford Street.

This happened on the Sunday, on which day none of the ladies had gone to
church. Mr. Emilius well understood the cause of their absence, and felt
nothing of a parson's anger at it. He was to marry the couple on the
Monday morning, and dined with the ladies on the Sunday. He was peculiarly
gracious and smiling, and spoke of the Hymeneals as though they were even
more than ordinarily joyful and happy in their promise. To Lizzie he was
almost affectionate, and Mrs. Carbuncle he flattered to the top of her
bent. The power of the man, in being sprightly under such a load of
trouble as oppressed the household, was wonderful. He had to do with three
women who were worldly, hard, and given entirely to evil things. Even as
regarded the bride, who felt the horror of her position, so much must be,
in truth, admitted. Though from day to day and hour to hour she would
openly declare her hatred of the things around her, yet she went on. Since
she had entered upon life she had known nothing but falsehood and scheming
wickedness; and, though she rebelled against the consequences, she had not
rebelled against the wickedness. Now, to this unfortunate young woman and
her two companions, Mr. Emilius discoursed with an unctuous mixture of
celestial and terrestrial glorification, which was proof, at any rate, of
great ability on his part. He told them how a good wife was a crown, or
rather a chaplet of ethereal roses to her husband, and how high rank and
great station in the world made such a chaplet more beautiful and more
valuable. His work in the vineyard, he said, had fallen lately among the
wealthy and nobly born; and though he would not say that he was entitled
to take glory on that account, still he gave thanks daily, in that he had
been enabled to give his humble assistance towards the running of a godly
life to those who, by their example, were enabled to have so wide an
effect upon their poorer fellow-creatures. He knew well how difficult it
was for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. They had the highest
possible authority for that. But Scriptures never said that the camel,
which, as he explained it, was simply a thread larger than ordinary
thread, could not go through the needle's eye. The camel which succeeded,
in spite of the difficulties attending its exalted position, would be
peculiarly blessed. And he went on to suggest that the three ladies before
him, one of whom was about to enter upon a new phase of life to-morrow,
under auspices peculiarly propitious, were, all of them, camels of this
description. Sir Griffin, when he came in, received for a while the
peculiar attention of Mr. Emilius. "I think, Sir Griffin," he commenced,
"that no period of a man's life is so blessed, as that upon which you will
enter to-morrow." This he said in a whisper, but it was a whisper audible
to the ladies.

"Well, yes; it's all right, I dare say," said Sir Griffin.

"Well, after all, what is life till a man has met and obtained the partner
of his soul? It is a blank, and the blank becomes every day more and more
intolerable to the miserable solitary."

"I wonder you don't get married yourself," said Mrs. Carbuncle, who
perceived that Sir Griffin was rather astray for an answer.

"Ah! if one could always be fortunate when one loved," said Mr. Emilius,
casting his eyes across to Lizzie Eustace. It was evident to them all that
he did not wish to conceal his passion.

It was the object of Mrs. Carbuncle that the lovers should not be left
alone together, but that they should be made to think that they were
passing the evening in affectionate intercourse. Lucinda hardly spoke,
hardly had spoken since her disagreeable struggle with Sir Griffin. He
said but little, but with Mrs. Carbuncle was better humoured than usual.
Every now and then she made little whispered communications to him,
telling that they would be sure to be at the church at eleven to the
moment, explaining to him what would be the extent of Lucinda's boxes for
the wedding tour, and assuring him that he would find Lucinda's new maid a
treasure in regard to his own shirts and pocket handkerchiefs. She toiled
marvellously at little subjects, always making some allusion to Lucinda,
and never hinting that aught short of Elysium was in store for him. The
labour was great; the task was terrible; but now it was so nearly over!
And to Lizzie she was very courteous, never hinting by a word or a look
that there was any new trouble impending on the score of the diamonds.
She, too, as she received the greasy compliments of Mr. Emilius with
pretty smiles, had her mind full enough of care.

At last Sir Griffin went, again kissing his bride as he left. Lucinda
accepted his embrace without a word and almost without a shudder. "Eleven
to the moment, Sir Griffin," said Mrs. Carbuncle, with her best good-
humour.

"All right," said Sir Griffin as he passed out of the door. Lucinda walked
across the room and kept her eyes fixed on his retreating figure as he
descended the stairs. Mr. Emilius had already departed, with many promises
of punctuality, and Lizzie now withdrew for the night.

"Dear Lizzie, good-night," said Mrs. Carbuncle kissing her.

"Good-night, Lady Eustace," said Lucinda. "I suppose I shall see you to-
morrow?"

"See me, of course you will see me! I shall come into your room with the
girls after you have had your tea." The girls mentioned were the four
bridesmaids, as to whom there had been some difficulty, as Lucinda had
neither sister nor cousin, and had contracted no peculiarly tender
friendships. But Mrs. Carbuncle had arranged it, and four properly-
equipped young ladies were to be in attendance at ten on the morrow.

Then Lucinda and Mrs. Carbuncle were alone. "Of one thing I feel sure,"
said Lucinda in a low voice.

"What is that, dear?"

"I shall never see Sir Griffin Tewett again."

"You talk in that way on purpose to break me down at the last moment,"
said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"Dear Aunt Jane, I would not break you down if I could help it. I have
struggled so hard, simply that you might be freed from me. We have been
very foolish, both of us; but I would bear all the punishment if I could."

"You know that this is nonsense now."

"Very well. I only tell you. I know that I shall never see him again. I
will never trust myself alone in his presence. I could not do it. When he
touches me my whole body is in agony; to be kissed by him is madness!"

"Lucinda, this is very wicked. You are working yourself up to a paroxysm
of folly."

"Wicked; yes, I know that I am wicked. There has been enough of wickedness
certainly. You don't suppose that I mean to excuse myself?"

"Of course you will marry Sir Griffin to-morrow."

"I shall never be married to him. How I shall escape from him--by dying,
or going mad, or by destroying him--God only knows." Then she paused, and
her aunt looking into her face almost began to fear that she was in
earnest. But she would not take it as at all indicating any real result
for the morrow. The girl had often said nearly the same thing before, and
had still submitted. "Do you know Aunt Jane, I don't think I could feel to
any man as though I loved him. But for this man--O God, how I do detest
him! I cannot do it."

"You had better go to bed, Lucinda, and let me come to you in the
morning."

"Yes; come to me in the morning, early."

"I will, at eight."

"I shall know then, perhaps."

"My dear, will you come to my room to-night and sleep with me?"

"Oh, no. I have ever so many things to do. I have papers to burn, and
things to put away. But come to me at eight. Goodnight, Aunt Jane." Mrs.
Carbuncle went up to her room with her, kissed her affectionately, and
then left her.

She was now really frightened. What would be said of her if she should
press the marriage forward to a completion, and if, after that, some
terrible tragedy should take place between the bride and bridegroom? That
Lucinda, in spite of all that had been said, would stand at the altar, and
allow the ceremony to be performed, she still believed. Those last words
about burning papers and putting things away seemed to imply that the girl
still thought that she would be taken away from her present home on the
morrow. But what would come afterwards? The horror which the bride
expressed was, as Mrs. Carbuncle well knew, no mock feeling, no pretence
at antipathy. She tried to think of it and to realise what might, in
truth, be the girl's action and ultimate fate when she should find herself
in the power of this man whom she so hated. But had not other girls done
the same thing, and lived through it all, and become fat, indifferent, and
fond of the world? It is only the first step that signifies.

At any rate the thing must go on now; must go on whatever might be the
result to Lucinda or to Mrs. Carbuncle herself. Yes; it must go on. There
was, no doubt, very much of bitterness in the world for such as them, for
persons doomed by the necessities of their position to a continual
struggle. It always had been so and always would be so. But each bitter
cup must be drained in the hope that the next might be sweeter. Of course
the marriage must go on; though doubtless this cup was very bitter.

More than once in the night Mrs. Carbuncle crept up to the door of her
niece's room, endeavouring to ascertain what might be going on within. At
two o'clock, while she was on the landing, the candle was extinguished,
and she could hear Lucinda put herself to bed. At any rate so far things
were safe. An indistinct, incompleted idea of some possible tragedy had
flitted across the mind of the poor woman, causing her to shake and
tremble, forbidding her, weary as she was, to lie down; but now she told
herself at last that this was an idle phantasy, and she went to bed. Of
course Lucinda must go through with it. It had been her own doing, and Sir
Griffin was not worse than other men. As she said this to herself, Mrs.
Carbuncle hardened her heart by remembering that her own married life had
not been peculiarly happy.

Exactly at eight on the following morning she knocked at her niece's door
and was at once bidden to enter. "Come in, Aunt Jane." The words cheered
her wonderfully. At any rate there had been no tragedy as yet, and as she
turned the handle of the door she felt that, as a matter of course, the
marriage would go on just like any other marriage. She found Lucinda up
and dressed, but so dressed certainly to show no preparation for a wedding
toilet. She had on an ordinary stuff morning frock, and her hair was close
tucked up and pinned as it might have been had she already prepared
herself for a journey. But what astonished Mrs. Carbuncle more than the
dress was the girl's manner. She was sitting at a table with a book before
her, which was afterwards found to be the Bible, and she never turned her
head as her aunt entered the room.

"What, up already," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "and dressed?"

"Yes; I am up, and dressed. I have been up ever so long. How was I to lie
in bed on such a morning as this? Aunt Jane, I wish you to know as soon as
possible that no earthly consideration will induce me to leave this room
to-day."

"What nonsense, Lucinda!"

"Very well; all the same you might as well believe me. I want you to send
to Mr. Emilius, and to those girls, and to the man. And you had better get
Lord George to let the other people know. I'm quite in earnest."

And she was in earnest, quite in earnest, though there was a flightiness
about her manner which induced Mrs. Carbuncle for a while to think that
she was less so than she had been on the previous evening. The unfortunate
woman remained with her niece for an hour and a half, imploring,
threatening, scolding, and weeping. When the maids came to the door, first
one maid and then another, they were refused entrance. It might still be
possible, Mrs. Carbuncle thought, that she would prevail. But nothing now
could shake Lucinda or induce her even to discuss the subject. She sat
there looking steadfastly at the book--hardly answering, never defending
herself, but protesting that nothing should induce her to leave the room
on that day.

"Do you want to destroy me?" Mrs. Carbuncle said at last.

"You have destroyed me," said Lucinda.

At half-past nine Lizzie Eustace came into the room, and Mrs. Carbuncle,
in her trouble, thought it better to take other counsel. Lizzie therefore
was admitted.

"Is anything wrong?" asked Lizzie.

"Everything is wrong," said the aunt. "She says that--she won't be
married."

"Oh, Lucinda!"

"Pray speak to her, Lady Eustace. You see it is getting so late, and she
ought to be nearly dressed now. Of course she must allow herself to be
dressed."

"I am dressed," said Lucinda.

"But, dear Lucinda, everybody will be waiting for you," said Lizzie.

"Let them wait, till they're tired. If Aunt Jane doesn't choose to send,
it is not my fault. I sha'n't go out of this room to-day unless I am
carried out. Do you want to hear that I have murdered the man?"

They brought her tea, and endeavoured to induce her to eat and drink. She
would take the tea, she said, if they would promise to send to put the
people off. Mrs. Carbuncle so far gave way as to undertake to do so, if
she would name the next day, or the day following, for the wedding. But on
hearing this she arose almost in a majesty of wrath. Neither on this day,
nor on the next, nor on any following day, would she yield herself to the
wretch whom they had endeavoured to force upon her.

"She must do it, you know," said Mrs. Carbuncle, turning to Lizzie.

"You'll see if I must," said Lucinda, sitting square at the table with her
eyes firmly fixed upon the book.

Then came up the servant to say that the four bridesmaids were all
assembled in the drawing-room. When she heard this, even Mrs. Carbuncle
gave way, and threw herself upon the bed and wept. "Oh, Lady Eustace, what
are we to do? Lucinda, you have destroyed me. You have destroyed me
altogether, after all that I have done for you."

"And what has been done to me, do you think?" said Lucinda.

Something must be settled. All the servants in the house by this time knew
that there would be no wedding, and no doubt some tidings as to the
misadventure of the day had already reached the four ladies in the
drawing-room. "What am I to do?" said Mrs. Carbuncle, starting up from the
bed.

"I really think you had better send to Mr. Emilius," said Lizzie; "and to
Lord George."

"What am I to say? Who is there to go to? Oh, I wish that somebody would
kill me this minute! Lady Eustace, would you mind going down and telling
those ladies to go away?"

"And had I not better send Richard to the church?"

"Oh yes; send anybody, everywhere. I don't know what to do. Oh, Lucinda,
this is the unkindest and the wickedest, and most horrible thing that
anybody ever did! I shall never, never be able to hold up my head again."
Mrs. Carbuncle was completely prostrate, but Lucinda sat square at the
table, firm as a rock, saying nothing, making no excuse for herself, with
her eyes fixed upon the Bible.

Lady Eustace carried her message to the astonished and indignant
bridesmaids, and succeeded in sending them back to their respective homes.
Richard, glorious in new livery, forgetting that his flowers were still on
his breast, ready dressed to attend the bride's carriage, went with his
sad message, first to the church and then to the banqueting-hall in
Albemarle Street.

"Not any wedding?" said the head-waiter at the hotel. "I knew they was
folks as would have a screw loose somewheres. There's lots to stand for
the bill, anyways," he added, as he remembered all the tribute.




CHAPTER LXX

ALAS!


No attempt was made to send other messages from Hertford Street than those
which were taken to the church and to the hotel. Sir Griffin and Lord
George went together to the church in a brougham, and on the way the best
man rather ridiculed the change in life which he supposed that his friend
was about to make.

"I don't in the least know how you mean to get along," said Lord George.

"Much as other men do, I suppose."

"But you're always sparring, already."

"It's that old woman that you're so fond of," said Sir Griffin. "I don't
mean to have any ill-humour from my wife, I can tell you. I know who will
have the worst of it if there is."

"Upon my word, I think you'll have your hands full," said Lord George.
They got out at a sort of private door attached to the chapel, and were
there received by the clerk, who wore a very long face. The news had
already come, and had been communicated to Mr. Emilius, who was in the
vestry. "Are the ladies here yet?" asked Lord George. The woebegone clerk
told them that the ladies were not yet there, and suggested that they
should see Mr. Emilius. Into the presence of Mr. Emilius they were led,
and then they heard the truth.

"Sir Griffin," said Mr. Emilius, holding the baronet by the hand, "I'm
sorry to have to tell you that there's something wrong in Hertford
Street."

"What's wrong?" asked Sir Griffin.

"You don't mean to say that Miss Roanoke is not to be here?" demanded Lord
George. "By George, I thought as much--I did indeed."

"I can only tell you what I know, Lord George. Mrs. Carbuncle's servant
was here ten minutes since, Sir Griffin, before I came down, and he told
the clerk that--that----"

"What the d---- did he tell him?" asked Sir Griffin.

"He said that Miss Roanoke had changed her mind, and didn't mean to be
married at all. That's all that I can learn from what he says. Perhaps you
will think it best to go up to Hertford Street?"

"I'll be ---- if I do," said Sir Griffin.

"I am not in the least surprised," repeated Lord George. "Tewett, my boy,
we might as well go home to lunch, and the sooner you're out of town the
better."

"I knew that I should be taken in at last by that accursed woman," said
Sir Griffin.

"It wasn't Mrs. Carbuncle, if you mean that. She'd have given her left
hand to have had it completed. I rather think you've had an escape, Griff;
and if I were you, I'd make the best of it." Sir Griffin spoke not another
word, but left the church with his friend in the brougham that had brought
them, and so he disappears from our story. Mr. Emilius looked after him
with wistful eyes, regretful for his fee. Had the baronet been less coarse
and violent in his language he would have asked for it; but he feared that
he might be cursed in his own church, before his clerk, and abstained.
Late in the afternoon Lord George, when he had administered comfort to the
disappointed bridegroom in the shape of a hot lunch, curaçoa, and cigars,
walked up to Hertford Street, calling at the hotel in Albemarle Street on
the way. The waiter told him all that he knew. Some thirty or forty guests
had come to the wedding-banquet, and had all been sent away with tidings
that the marriage had been--postponed.

"You might have told 'em a trifle more than that," said Lord George.

"Postponed was pleasantest, my lord," said the waiter. "Anyways, that was
said, and we supposes, my lord, as the things ain't wanted now."

Lord George replied that as far as he knew the things were not wanted, and
then continued his way up to Hertford Street.

At first he saw Lizzie Eustace, upon whom the misfortune of the day had
had a most depressing effect. The wedding was to have been the one morsel
of pleasing excitement which would come before she underwent the humble
penance to which she was doomed. That was frustrated and abandoned, and
now she could think only of Mr. Camperdown, her cousin Frank, and Lady
Glencora Palliser. "What's up now?" said Lord George, with that disrespect
which had always accompanied his treatment of her since she had told him
her secret. "What's the meaning of all this?"

"I dare say that you know as well as I do, my lord."

"I must know a good deal if I do. It seems that among you there is nothing
but one trick upon another."

"I suppose you are speaking of your own friends, Lord George. You
doubtless know much more than I do of Miss Roanoke's affairs."

"Does she mean to say that she doesn't mean to marry the man at all?"

"So I understand; but really you had better send for Mrs. Carbuncle."

He did send for Mrs. Carbuncle, and after some words with her was taken up
into Lucinda's room. There sat the unfortunate girl, in the chair from
which she had not moved since the morning. There had come over her face a
look of fixed but almost idiotic resolution; her mouth was compressed, and
her eyes were glazed, and she sat twiddling her book before her with her
fingers. She had eaten nothing since she had got up, and had long ceased
to be violent when questioned by her aunt. But nevertheless she was firm
enough when her aunt begged to be allowed to write a letter to Sir
Griffin, explaining that all this had arisen from temporary indisposition.

"No; it isn't temporary. It isn't temporary at all. You can write to him,
but I'll never come out of this room if I am told that I am to see him."

"What is all this about, Lucinda?" said Lord George, speaking in his
kindest voice.

"Is he there?" said she, turning round suddenly.

"Sir Griffin? no, indeed. He has left town."

"You're sure he's not there? It's no good his coming. If he comes for ever
and ever he shall never touch me again--not alive; he shall never touch me
again alive." As she spoke she moved across the room to the fire-place and
grasped the poker in her hand.

"Has she been like that all the morning?" whispered Lord George.

"No--not like--she has been quite quiet. Lucinda!"

"Don't let him come here, then; that's all. What's the use? They can't
make me marry him. And I won't marry him. Everybody has known that I hated
him--detested him. Oh, Lord George, it has been very, very cruel."

"Has it been my fault, Lucinda?"

"She wouldn't have done it if you had told her not. But you won't bring
him again, will you?"

"Certainly not. He means to go abroad."

"Ah, yes; that will be best. Let him go abroad. He knew it all the time,
that I hated him. Why did he want me to be his wife? If he has gone abroad
I will go down-stairs. But I won't go out of the house. Nothing shall make
me go out of the house. Are the bridesmaids gone?"

"Long ago," said Mrs. Carbuncle piteously.

"Then I will go down." And between them, they led her into the drawing-
room.

"It is my belief," said Lord George to Mrs. Carbuncle some minutes
afterward, "that you have driven her mad."

"Are you going to turn against me?"

"It is true. How you have had the heart to go on pressing it upon her, I
could never understand. I am about as hard as a milestone, but I'll be
shot if I could have done it. From day to day I thought that you would
have given way."

"That is so like a man--when it is all over to turn upon a woman and say
that she did it."

"Didn't you do it? I thought you did, and that you took a great deal of
pride in the doing of it. When you made him offer to her, down in
Scotland, and made her accept him, you were so proud that you could hardly
hold yourself. What will you do now? Go on, just as though nothing had
happened?"

"I don't know what we shall do. There will be so many things to be paid."

"I should think there would, and you can hardly expect Sir Griffin to pay
for them. You'll have to take her away somewhere. You'll find that she
can't remain here. And that other woman will be in prison before the
week's over, I should say, unless she runs away."

There was not much of comfort to be obtained by any of them from Lord
George, who was quite as harsh to Mrs. Carbuncle as he had been to Lizzie
Eustace. He remained in Hertford Street for an hour, and then took his
leave, saying that he thought that he also should go abroad. "I didn't
think," he said, "that anything could have hurt my character much; but
upon my word, between you and Lady Eustace, I begin to find that in every
deep there may be a lower depth. All the town has given me the credit for
stealing her ladyship's necklace, and now I shall be mixed up in this mock
marriage. I shouldn't wonder if Rooper were to send his bill in to me."
(Mr. Rooper was the keeper of the hotel in Albemarle Street.) "I think I
shall follow Sir Griffin abroad. You have made England too hot to hold
me."

And so he left them.

The evening of that day was a terrible time to the three ladies in
Hertford Street, and the following day was almost worse. Nobody came to
see them, and not one of them dared to speak of the future. For the third
day, the Wednesday, Lady Eustace had made her appointment with Mr.
Camperdown, having written to the attorney, in compliance with the
pressing advice of Major Mackintosh, to name an hour. Mr. Camperdown had
written again, sending his compliments, and saying that he would receive
Lady Eustace at the time fixed by her. The prospect of this interview was
very bad, but even this was hardly so oppressive as the actual, existing
wretchedness of that house. Mrs. Carbuncle, whom Lizzie had always known
as high-spirited, bold, and almost domineering, was altogether prostrated
by her misfortunes. She was querulous, lachrymose, and utterly despondent.
From what Lizzie now learned, her hostess was enveloped in a mass of debt
which would have been hopeless even had Lucinda gone off as a bride; but
she had been willing to face all that with the object of establishing her
niece. She could have expected nothing from the marriage for herself. She
well knew that Sir Griffin would neither pay her debts nor give her a home
nor lend her money. But to have married the girl who was in her charge
would have been in itself a success, and would have in some sort repaid
her for her trouble. There would have been something left to show for her
expenditure of time and money. But now there was nothing around her but
failure and dismay. The very servants in the house seemed to know that
ordinary respect was hardly demanded from them.

As to Luanda, Lizzie felt, from the very hour in which she first saw her,
on the morning of the intended wedding, that her mind was astray. She
insisted on passing the time up in her own room, and always sat with the
Bible before her. At every knock at the door, or ring at the bell, she
would look round suspiciously, and once she whispered into Lizzie's ear
that if ever "he" should come there again she would "give him a kiss with
a vengeance." On the Tuesday "Lizzie recommended Mrs. Carbuncle to get
medical advice, and at last they sent for Mr. Emilius that they might ask
counsel of him. Mr. Emilius was full of smiles and consolation, and still
allowed his golden hopes as to some Elysian future to crop out; but he did
acknowledge at last, in a whispered conference with Lady Eustace, that
somebody ought see to Miss Roanoke. Somebody did see Miss Roanoke, and the
doctor who was thus appealed to shook his head. Perhaps Miss Roanoke had
better be taken into the country for a little while.

"Dear Lady Eustace," said Mrs. Carbuncle, "now you can be a friend
indeed," meaning, of course, that an invitation to Portray Castle would do
more than could anything else towards making straight the crooked things
of the hour. Mrs. Carbuncle, when she made the request, of course knew of
Lizzie's coming troubles; but let them do what they could to Lizzie, they
could not take away her house.

But Lizzie felt at once that this would not suit. "Ah, Mrs. Carbuncle,"
she said, "you do not know the condition which I am in myself!"




CHAPTER LXXI

LIZZIE IS THREATENED WITH THE TREADMILL


Early on the Wednesday morning, two or three hours before the time fixed
for Lizzie's visit to Mr. Camperdown, her cousin Frank came to call upon
her. She presumed him to be altogether ignorant of all that Major
Mackintosh had known, and therefore endeavoured to receive him as though
her heart were light.

"Oh, Frank," said she, "you have heard of our terrible misfortune here?"

"I have heard so much," said he gravely, "that I hardly know what to
believe, and what not to believe."

"I mean about Miss Roanoke's marriage?"

"Oh, yes; I have been told that it is broken off."

Then Lizzie, with affected eagerness, gave him a description of the whole
affair, declaring how horrible, how tragic, the thing had been from its
very commencement. "Don't you remember, Frank, down at Portray, they never
really cared for each other? They became engaged the very time you were
there."

"I have not forgotten it."

"The truth is, Lucinda Roanoke did not understand what real love meant.
She had never taught herself to comprehend what is the very essence of
love, and as for Sir Griffin Tewett, though he was anxious to marry her,
he never had any idea of love at all. Did not you always feel that,
Frank?"

"I'm sorry you have had so much to do with them, Lizzie."

"There's no help for spilt milk, Frank; and, as for that, I don't suppose
that Mrs. Carbuncle can do me any harm. The man is a baronet, and the
marriage would have been respectable. Miss Roanoke has been eccentric, and
that has been the long and the short of it. What will be done, Frank, with
all the presents that were bought?"

"I haven't an idea. They'd better be sold to pay the bills. But I came to
you, Lizzie, about another piece of business."

"What piece of business?" she asked, looking him in the face for a moment,
trying to be bold, but trembling as she did 50. She had believed him to be
ignorant of her story, but she had soon perceived, from his manner to her,
that he knew it all, or at least that he knew so much that she would have
to tell him all the rest. There could be no longer any secret with him.
Indeed there could be no longer any secret with anybody. She must be
prepared to encounter a world accurately informed as to every detail of
the business which, for the last three months, had been to her a burden so
oppressive that, at some periods, she had sunk altogether under the
weight. She had already endeavoured to realise her position, and to make
clear to herself the condition of her future life. Lord George had talked
to her of perjury and prison, and had tried to frighten her by making the
very worst her faults. According to him, she would certainly be made to
pay for the diamonds, and would be enabled to do so by saving her income
during a long term of incarceration. This was a terrible prospect of
things; and she had almost believed in it. Then the major had come to her.
The major, she thought, was the truest gentleman she had ever seen, and
her best friend. Ah--if it had not been for the wife and seven children,
there might still have been comfort! That which had been perjury with Lord
George, had by the major been so simply, and yet so correctly, called an
incorrect version of facts! And so it was--and no more than that. Lizzie,
in defending herself to herself, felt that, though cruel magistrates and
hard-hearted lawyers and pig-headed jurymen might call her little fault by
the name of perjury, it could not be real, wicked perjury, because the
diamonds had been her own. She had defrauded nobody--had wished to defraud
nobody--if the people had only left her alone. It had suited her to give--
an incorrect version of facts, because people had troubled themselves
about her affairs; and now all this had come upon her! The major had
comforted her very greatly; but still--what would the world say? Even he,
kind and comfortable as he had been, had made her understand that she must
go into court and confess the incorrectness of her own version. She
believed every word the major said. Ah, there was a man worthy to be
believed--a man of men! They could not take away her income or her castle.
They could not make her pay for the diamonds. But still--what would the
world say? And what would her lovers say? What one of her lovers thought
proper to say, she had already heard. Lord George had spoken out, and had
made himself very disagreeable. Lord Fawn, she knew, would withdraw the
renewal of his offer, let her answer to him be what it might. But what
would Frank say? And now Frank was with her, looking into her face with
severe eyes.

She was more than ever convinced that the life of a widow was not suited
for her and that, among her several lovers, she must settle her wealth and
her heart upon some special lover. Neither her wealth nor her heart would
be in any way injured by the confession which she was prepared to make.
But then men are so timid, so false, and so blind! In regard to Frank,
whom she now believed that she had loved with all the warmth of her young
affections from the first moment in which she had seen him after Sir
Florian's death--she had been at great trouble to clear the way for him.
She knew of his silly engagement to Lucy Morris, and was willing to
forgive him that offence. She knew that he could not marry Lucy, because
of his pennilessness and his indebtedness; and therefore she had taken the
trouble to see Lucy, with the view of making things straight on that side.
Lucy had, of course, been rough with her, and ill-mannered, but Lizzie
thought that, upon the whole, she had succeeded. Lucy was rough and ill-
mannered, but was, at the same time, what the world calls good, and would
hardly persevere after what had been said to her. Lizzie was sure that, a
month since, her cousin would have yielded himself to her willingly, if he
could only have freed himself from Lucy Morris. But now, just in this very
nick of time, which was so momentous to her, the police had succeeded in
unravelling her secret, and there sat Frank, looking at her with stern,
ill-natured eyes, like an enemy rather than a lover.

"What piece of business?" she asked, in answer to his question. She must
be bold--if she could. She must brazen it out with him, if only she could
be strong enough to put on her brass in his presence. He had been so
stupidly chivalrous in believing all her stories about the robbery when
nobody else had quite believed them, that she felt that she had before her
a task that was very disagreeable and very difficult. She looked up at
him, struggling to be bold, and then her glance sank before his gaze and
fell upon the floor.

"I do not at all wish to pry into your secrets," he said.

Secrets from him! Some such exclamation was on her lips, when she
remembered that her special business, at the present moment, was to
acknowledge a secret which had been kept from him.

"It is unkind of you to speak to me in that way," said she.

"I am quite in earnest. I do not wish to pry into your secrets. But I hear
rumours which seem to be substantiated; and though, of course, I could
stay away from you----"

"Oh--whatever happens, pray, pray do not stay away from me. Where am I to
look for advice if you stay away from me?"

"That is all very well, Lizzie."

"Ah, Frank, if you desert me, I am undone."

"It is of course true that some of the police have been with you lately?"

"Major Mackintosh was here, about the end of last week--a most kind man,
altogether a gentleman, and I was so glad to see him."

"What made him come?"

"What made him come?" How should she tell her story? "Oh, he came--of
course, about the robbery. They have found out everything. It was the
jeweller, Benjamin, who concocted it all. That horrid, sly girl I had,
Patience Crabstick, put him up to it. And there were two regular
housebreakers. They have found it all out at last."

"So I hear."

"And Major Mackintosh came to tell me about it."

"But the diamonds are gone!"

"Oh, yes--those weary, weary diamonds. Do you know, Frank, that, though
they were my own, as much as the coat you wear is your own, I am glad they
are gone, then I am glad that the police have not found them. They
tormented me so that I hated them. Don't you remember that I told you how
I longed to throw them into the sea, and be rid of them forever?"

"That, of course, was a joke."

"It was no joke, Frank. It was solemn, serious truth."

"What I want to know is--where were they stolen?"

That of course was the question which hitherto Lizzie Eustace had answered
by an incorrect version of facts, and now she must give the true version.
She tried to put a bold face upon it, but it was very difficult. A face
bold with brass she could not assume. Perhaps a little bit of acting might
serve her turn, and a face that should be tender rather than bold.

"Oh, Frank!" she exclaimed, bursting into tears.

"I always supposed that they were taken at Carlisle," said Frank. Lizzie
fell on her knees, at his feet, with her hands clasped together, and her
one long lock of hair hanging down so as to touch his arm. Her eyes were
bright with tears, but were not, as yet, wet and red with weeping. Was not
this confession enough? Was he so hard-hearted as to make her tell her own
disgrace in spoken words? Of course he knew well enough, now, when the
diamonds had been stolen. If he were possessed of any tenderness, any
tact, any manliness, he would go on, presuming that question to have been
answered.

"I don't quite understand it all," he said, laying his hand softly upon
her shoulder. "I have been led to make so many statements to other people
which now seem to have been--incorrect! It was only the box that was taken
at Carlisle?"

"Only the box." She could answer that question.

"But the thieves thought that the diamonds were in the box?"

"I suppose so. But, oh, Frank, don't cross-question me about it. If you
could know what I have suffered, you would not punish me any more. I have
got to go to Mr. Camperdown's this very day. I offered to do that at once,
and I sha'n't have strength to go through it if you are not kind to me
now. Dear, dear Frank--do be kind to me."

And he was kind to her. He lifted her up to the sofa and did not ask her
another question about the necklace. Of course she had lied to him and to
all the world. From the very commencement of his intimacy with her, he had
known that she was a liar, and what else could he have expected but lies?
As it happened, this particular lie had been very big, very efficacious,
and the cause of boundless troubles. It had been wholly unnecessary, and
from the first, though injurious to many, more injurious to her than to
any other. He himself had been injured, but it seemed to him now that she
had absolutely ruined herself. And all this had been done for nothing--had
been done, as he thought, that Mr. Camperdown might be kept in the dark,
whereas all the light in the world would have assisted Mr. Camperdown
nothing. He brought to mind, as he stood over her, all those scenes which
she had so successfully performed in his presence since she had come to
London--scenes in which the robbery in Carlisle had been discussed between
them. She had on these occasions freely expressed her opinion about the
necklace, saying in a low whisper, with a pretty little shrug of her
shoulders, that she presumed it to be impossible that Lord George should
have been concerned in the robbery. Frank had felt, as she said so, that
some suspicion was intended by her to be attached to Lord George. She had
wondered whether Mr. Camperdown had known anything about it. She had hoped
that Lord Fawn would now be satisfied. She had been quite convinced that
Mr. Benjamin had the diamonds. She had been indignant that the police had
not traced the property. She had asked in another whisper--a very low
whisper indeed--whether it was possible that Mrs. Carbuncle should know
more about it than she was pleased to tell? And all the while the necklace
had been lying in her own desk, and she had put it there with her own
hands!

It was marvellous to him that the woman could have been so false and have
sustained her falsehood so well. And this was his cousin, his well-
beloved; as a cousin, certainly well-beloved; and there had doubtless been
times in which he had thought that he would make her his wife! He could
not but smile as he stood looking at her, contemplating all the confusion
which she had caused, and thinking how very little the disclosure of her
iniquity seemed to confound herself.

"Oh, Frank, do not laugh at me," she said.

"I am not laughing, Lizzie; I am only wondering."

"And now, Frank, what had I better do?"

"Ah, that is difficult, is it not? You see I hardly know all the truth
yet. I do not want to know more, but how can I advise you?"

"I thought you knew everything."

"I don't suppose anybody can do anything to you."

"Major Mackintosh says that nobody can. He quite understands that they
were my own property, and that I had a right to keep them in my desk if I
pleased. Why was I to tell everybody where they were? Of course I was
foolish, and now they are lost. It is I that have suffered. Major
Mackintosh quite understands that, and says that nobody can do anything to
me; only I must go to Mr. Camperdown."

"You will have to be examined again before a magistrate."

"Yes; I suppose I must be examined. You will go with me, Frank, won't
you?" He winced, and made no immediate reply. "I don't mean to Mr.
Camperdown, but before the magistrate. Will it be in a court?"

"I suppose so."

"The gentleman came here before. Couldn't he come here again?" Then he
explained to her the difference of her present position, and in doing so
he did say something of her iniquity. He made her understand that the
magistrate had gone out of his way at the last inquiry, believing her to
be a lady who had been grievously wronged, and one, therefore, to whom
much consideration was due. "And I have been grievously wronged," said
Lizzie. But now she would be required to tell the truth in opposition to
the false evidence which she had formerly given; and she would herself be
exempted from prosecution for perjury only on the ground that she would be
called on to criminate herself in giving evidence against criminals whose
crimes had been deeper than her own. "I suppose they can't quite eat me,"
she said, smiling through her tears.

"No; they won't eat you," he replied gravely.

"And you will go with me?"

"Yes; I suppose I had better do so."

"Ah, that will be so nice." The idea of the scene at the police-court was
not at all "nice" to Frank Greystock. "I shall not mind what they say to
me as long as you are by my side. Everybody will know that they were my
own, won't they?"

"And there will be the trial afterwards."

"Another trial?" Then he explained to her the course of affairs; that the
men might not improbably be tried at Carlisle for stealing the box, and
again in London for stealing the diamonds; that two distinct acts of
burglary had been committed, and that her evidence would be required on
both occasions. He told her also that her attendance before the magistrate
on Friday would be only a preliminary ceremony, and that before the thing
was over she would doubtless be doomed to bear a great deal of annoyance,
and to answer very many disagreeable questions. "I shall care for nothing
if you will only be at my side," she exclaimed.

He was very urgent with her to go to Scotland as soon as her examination
before the magistrates should be over, and was much astonished at the
excuse she made for not doing so. Mrs. Carbuncle had borrowed all her
ready money; but as she was now in Mrs. Carbuncle's house she could repay
herself a portion of the loan by remaining there and eating it out. She
did not exactly say how much Mrs. Carbuncle had borrowed, but she left an
impression on Frank's mind that it was about ten times the actual sum.
With this excuse he was not satisfied, and told her that she must go to
Scotland, if only for the sake of escaping from the Carbuncle connection.
She promised to obey him if he would be her convoy. The Easter holidays
were just now at hand, and he could not refuse on the plea of time. "Oh,
Frank, do not refuse me this; only think how terribly forlorn is my
position!" He did not refuse, but he did not quite promise. He was still
tender-hearted towards her in spite of her enormities. One iniquity,
perhaps her worst iniquity, he did not yet know. He had not as yet heard
of her disinterested appeal to Lucy Morris.

When he left her she was almost joyous for a few minutes, till the thought
of her coming interview with Mr. Camperdown again overshadowed her. She
had dreaded two things chiefly--her first interview with her cousin Frank
after he should have learned the truth, and those perils in regard to
perjury with which Lord George had threatened her. Both these bugbears had
now vanished. That dear man, the major, had told her that there would be
no such perils, and her cousin Frank had not seemed to think so very much
of her lies and treachery! He had still been affectionate with her; he
would support her before the magistrate, and would travel with her to
Scotland. And after that who could tell what might come next? How foolish
she had been to trouble herself as she had done--almost to choke herself
with an agony of fear, because she had feared detection. Now she was
detected, and what had come of it? That great officer of justice, Major
Mackintosh, had been almost more than civil to her; and her dear cousin
Frank was still a cousin, dear as ever. People, after all, did not think
so very much of perjury--of perjury such as hers, committed in regard to
one's own property. It was that odious Lord George who had frightened her
instead of comforting, as he would have done had there been a spark of the
true Corsair poetry about him. She did not feel comfortably content as to
what might be said of her by Lady Glencora and the Duke of Omnium, but she
was almost inclined to think that Lady Glencora would support her. Lady
Glencora was no poor, mealy-mouthed thing, but a woman of the world, who
understood' what was what. Lizzie no doubt wished that the trials and
examinations were over; but her money was safe. They could not take away
Portray, nor could they rob her of four thousand a year. As for the rest,
she could live it down.

She had ordered the carriage to take her to Mr. Camperdown's chambers, and
now she dressed herself for the occasion. He should not be made to think,
at any rate by her outside appearance, that she was ashamed of herself.
But before she started she had just a word with Mrs. Carbuncle. "I think I
shall go down to Scotland on Saturday," she said, proclaiming her news not
in the most gracious manner.

"That is if they let you go," said Mrs. Carbuncle.

"What do you mean? Who is to prevent me?"

"The police. I know all about it, Lady Eustace, and you need not look like
that. Lord George informs me that you will--probably be locked up to-day
or to-morrow."

"Lord George is a story-teller. I don't believe he ever said so. And if he
did, he knows nothing about it."

"He ought to know, considering all that you have made him suffer. That you
should have gone on with the necklace in your own box all the time,
letting people think that he had taken it, and accepting his attentions
all the while, is what I cannot understand! And however you were able to
look those people at Carlisle in the face, passes me! Of course, Lady
Eustace, you can't stay here after what has occurred."

"I shall stay just as long as I like."

"Poor, dear Lucinda! I do not wonder that she should be driven beyond
herself by so horrible a story. The feeling that she has been living all
this time in the same house with a woman who had deceived all the police--
all the police--has been too much for her. I know it has been almost too
much for me." And yet, as Lizzie at once understood, Mrs. Carbuncle knew
nothing now which she had not known when she made her petition to be taken
to Portray. And this was the woman, too, who had borrowed her money last
week, whom she had entertained for months at Portray, and who had
pretended to be her bosom-friend. "You are quite right in getting off to
Scotland as soon as possible--if they will let you go," continued Mrs.
Carbuncle. "Of course you could not stay here. Up to Friday night it can
be permitted; but the servants had better wait upon you in your own
rooms."

"How dare you talk to me in that way?" screamed Lizzie.

"When a woman has committed perjury," said Mrs. Carbuncle, holding up both
her hands in awe and grief, "nothing too bad can possibly be said to her.
You are amenable to the outraged laws of the country, and it is my belief
that they can keep you upon the treadmill and bread and water for months
and months, if not for years." Having pronounced this terrible sentence,
Mrs. Carbuncle stalked out of the room. "That they can sequester your
property for your creditors I know," she said, returning for a moment and
putting her head within the door.

The carriage was ready, and it was time for Lizzie to start if she
intended to keep her appointment with Mr. Camperdown. She was much
flustered and weakened by Mrs. Carbuncle's ill-usage, and had difficulty
in restraining herself from tears. And yet what the woman had said was
false from beginning to end. The maid who was the successor of Patience
Crabstick was to accompany her, and as she passed through the hall she so
far recovered herself as to be able to conceal her dismay from the
servants.




CHAPTER LXXII

LIZZIE'S TRIUMPHS


Reports had, of course, reached Mr. Camperdown of the true story of the
Eustace diamonds. He had learned that the Jew jeweller had made a
determined set at them, having in the first place hired housebreakers to
steal them at Carlisle, and having again hired the same housebreakers to
steal them from the house in Hertford Street, as soon as he knew that Lady
Eustace had herself secreted them. By degrees this information had reached
him, but not in a manner to induce him to declare himself satisfied with
the truth. But now Lady Eustace was coming to him--as he presumed, to
confess everything.

When he first heard that the diamonds had been stolen at Carlisle, he was
eager, with Mr. Eustace, in contending that the widow's liability in
regard to the property was not at all the less because she had managed to
lose it through her own pig-headed obstinacy. He consulted his trusted
friend, Mr. Dove, on the occasion, making out another case for the
barrister, and Mr. Dove had opined that if it could be first proved that
the diamonds were the property of the estate and not of Lady Eustace, and
afterwards proved that they had been stolen through her laches, then could
the Eustace estate recover the value from her estate. As she had carried
the diamonds about with her in an absurd manner, her responsibility might
probably be established; but the non-existence of ownership by her must be
first declared by a Vice-Chancellor, with probability of appeal to the
Lords Justices and to the House of Lords. A bill in Chancery must be
filed, in the first place, to have the question of ownership settled; and
then, should the estate be at length declared the owner, restitution of
the property which had been lost through the lady's fault must be sought
at common law.

That had been the opinion of the Turtle Dove, and Mr. Camperdown had at
once submitted to the law of his great legal mentor. But John Eustace had
positively declared when he heard it that no more money should be thrown
away in looking after property which would require two lawsuits to
establish, and which when established might not be recovered. "How can we
make her pay ten thousand pounds? She might die first," said John Eustace
--and Mr. Camperdown had been forced to yield. Then came the second
robbery, and gradually there was spread about a report that the diamonds
had been in Hertford Street all the time; that they had not been taken at
Carlisle, but certainly had been stolen at last.

Mr. Camperdown was again in a fever, and again had recourse to Mr. Dove
and to John Eustace. He learned from the police all that they would tell
him, and now the whole truth was to be divulged to him by the chief
culprit herself. For to the mind of Mr. Camperdown the two housebreakers,
and Patience Crabstick, and even Mr. Benjamin himself, were white as snow
compared with the blackness of Lady Eustace. In his estimation no
punishment could be too great for her, and yet he began to understand that
she would escape scot-free! Her evidence would be needed to convict the
thieves, and she could not be prosecuted for perjury when once she had
been asked for her evidence.

"After all, she has only told a fib about her own property," said the
Turtle Dove.

"About property not her own," replied Mr. Camperdown stoutly.

"Her own till the contrary shall have been proved; her own for all
purposes of defence before a jury, if she were prosecuted now. Were she
tried for the perjury, your attempt to obtain possession of the diamonds
would be all so much in her favour." With infinite regrets, Mr. Camperdown
began to perceive that nothing could be done to her.

But she was to come to him and let him know, from her own lips, facts of
which nothing more than rumour had yet reached him. He had commenced his
bill in Chancery, and had hitherto stayed proceedings simply because it
had been reported--falsely, as it now appeared--that the diamonds had been
stolen at Carlisle. Major Mackintosh, in his desire to use Lizzie's
evidence against the thieves, had recommended her to tell the whole truth
openly to those who claimed the property on behalf of her husband's
estate; and now, for the first time in her life, this odious woman was to
visit him in his own chambers.

He did not think it expedient to receive her alone. He consulted his
mentor, Mr. Dove, and his client, John Eustace, and the latter consented
to be present. It was suggested to Mr. Dove that he might, on so peculiar
an occasion as this, venture to depart from the established rule, and
visit the attorney on his own quarter-deck; but he smiled, and explained
that, though he was altogether superior to any such prejudice as that, and
would not object at all to call on his friend, Mr. Camperdown, could any
good effect arise from his doing so, he considered that were he to be
present on this occasion he would simply assist in embarrassing the poor
lady.

On this very morning, while Mrs. Carbuncle was abusing Lizzie in Hertford
Street, John Eustace and Mr. Camperdown were in Mr. Dove's chambers,
whither they had gone to tell him of the coming interview. The Turtle Dove
was sitting back in his chair, with his head leaning forward as though it
were going to drop from his neck, and the two visitors were listening to
his words. "Be merciful, I should say," suggested the barrister. John
Eustace was clearly of opinion that they ought to be merciful. Mr.
Camperdown did not look merciful. "What can you get by harassing the poor,
weak, ignorant creature?" continued Mr. Dove. "She has hankered after her
bauble, and has told falsehoods in her efforts to keep it. Have you never
heard of older persons, and more learned persons, and persons nearer to
ourselves, who have done the same?" At that moment there was presumed to
be great rivalry, not unaccompanied by intrigue, among certain leaders of
the learned profession, with reference to various positions of high honour
and emolument, vacant or expected to be vacant. A Lord Chancellor was
about to resign, and a Lord Justice had died. Whether a somewhat unpopular
Attorney-General should be forced to satisfy himself with the one place,
or allowed to wait for the other, had been debated in all the newspapers.
It was agreed that there was a middle course in reference to a certain
second-class chief-justiceship--only that the present second-class chief-
justice objected to shelving himself. There existed considerable jealousy,
and some statements had been made which were not, perhaps, strictly
founded on fact. It was understood both by the attorney and by the member
of Parliament that the Turtle Dove was referring to these circumstances
when he spoke of baubles and falsehoods, and of learned persons near to
themselves. He himself had hankered after no bauble, but, as is the case
with many men and women who are free from such hankerings, he was hardly
free from that dash of malice which the possession of such things in the
hands of others is so prone to excite. "Spare her," said Mr. Dove. "There
is no longer any material question as to the property, which seems to be
gone irrecoverably. It is, upon the whole, well for the world that
property so fictitious as diamonds should be subject to the risk of such
annihilation. As far as we are concerned, the property is annihilated, and
I would not harass the poor, ignorant young creature."

As Eustace and the attorney walked across from the old to the new square,
the former declared that he quite agreed with Mr. Dove. "In the first
place, Mr. Camperdown, she is my brother's widow." Mr. Camperdown with
sorrow admitted the fact. "And she is the mother of the head of our
family. It should not be for us to degrade her; but rather to protect her
from degradation, if that be possible."

"I heartily wish she had got her merits before your poor brother ever saw
her," said Mr. Camperdown.

Lizzie, in her fears, had been very punctual; and when the two gentlemen
reached the door leading up to Mr. Camperdown's chambers, the carriage was
already standing there. Lizzie had come up the stairs and had been
delighted at hearing that Mr. Camperdown was out, and would be back in a
moment. She instantly resolved that it did not become her to wait. She had
kept her appointment, had not found Mr. Camperdown at home, and would be
off as fast as her carriage wheels could take her. But, unfortunately,
while with a gentle murmur she was explaining to the clerk how impossible
it was that she should wait for a lawyer who did not keep his own
appointment, John Eustace and Mr. Camperdown appeared upon the landing,
and she was at once convoyed into the attorney's particular room.

Lizzie, who always dressed well, was now attired as became a lady of rank,
who had four thousand a year, and was the intimate friend of Lady Glencora
Palliser. When last she saw Mr. Camperdown she had been arrayed for a
long, dusty summer journey down to Scotland, and neither by her outside
garniture nor by her manner had she then been able to exact much
admiration. She had been taken by surprise in the street, and was
frightened. Now, in difficulty though she was, she resolved that she would
hold up her head and be very brave. She was a little taken aback when she
saw her brother-in-law, but she strove hard to carry herself with
confidence.

"Ah, John," she said, "I did not expect to find you with Mr. Camperdown."

"I thought it best that I should be here, as a friend," he said.

"It makes it much pleasanter for me, of course," said Lizzie. "I am not
quite sure that Mr. Camperdown will allow me to regard him as a friend."

"You have never had any reason to regard me as your enemy, Lady Eustace,"
said Mr. Camperdown. "Will you take a seat? I understand that you wish to
state the circumstances under which the Eustace family diamonds were
stolen while they were in your hands."

"My own diamonds, Mr. Camperdown."

"I cannot admit that for a moment, my lady."

"What does it signify?" said Eustace. "The wretched stones are gone
forever; and whether they were, of right, the property of my sister-in-law
or of her son, cannot matter now."

Mr. Camperdown was irritated and shook his head. It cut him to the heart
that everybody should take the part of the wicked, fraudulent woman who
had caused him such infinite trouble. Lizzie saw her opportunity, and was
bolder than ever. "You will never get me to acknowledge that they were not
my own," she said. "My husband gave them to me, and I know that they were
my own."

"They have been stolen, at any rate," said the lawyer.

"Yes; they have been stolen."

"And now will you tell us how?"

Lizzie looked round upon her brother-in-law and sighed. She had never yet
told the story in all its nakedness, although it had been three or four
times extracted from her by admission. She paused, hoping that questions
might be asked her which she could answer by easy monosyllables, but not a
word was uttered to help.

"I suppose you know all about it," she said at last.

"I know nothing about it," said Mr. Camperdown.

"We heard that your jewel-case was taken out of your room at Carlisle and
broken open," said Eustace.

"So it was. They broke into my room in the dead of night, when I was in
bed and fast asleep, and took the case away. When the morning came
everybody rushed into my room, and I was so frightened that I did not know
what I was doing. How would your daughter bear it if two men had cut away
the locks and got into her bedroom when she was asleep? You don't think
about that at all."

"And where was the necklace?" asked Eustace.

Lizzie remembered that her friend the major had specially advised her to
tell the whole truth to Mr. Camperdown, suggesting that by doing so she
would go far toward saving herself from any prosecution.

"It was under my pillow," she whispered.

"And why did you not tell the magistrate that it had been under your
pillow?"

Mr. Camperdown's voice, as he put to her this vital question, was severe,
and almost justified the little burst of sobs which came forth as a
prelude to Lizzie's answer. "I did not know what I was doing. I don't know
what you expect from me. You had been persecuting me ever since Sir
Florian's death, about the diamonds, and I didn't know what I was to do.
They were my own, and I thought I was not obliged to tell everybody where
I kept them. There are things which nobody tells. If I were to ask you all
your secrets would you tell them? When Sir Walter Scott was asked whether
he wrote the novels, he didn't tell."

"He was not upon his oath, Lady Eustace."

"He did take his oath, ever so many times. I don't know what difference an
oath makes. People ain't obliged to tell their secrets, and I wouldn't
tell mine."

"The difference is, Lady Eustace; that if you give false evidence upon
oath, you commit perjury."

"How was I to think of that, when I was so frightened and confused that I
didn't know where I was, or what I was doing? There--now I have told you
everything."

"Not quite everything. The diamonds were not stolen at Carlisle, but they
were stolen afterwards. Did you tell the police what you had lost, or the
magistrate, after the robbery in Hertford Street?"

"Yes; I did. There was some money taken, and rings, and other jewelry."

"Did you tell them that the diamonds had been really stolen on that
occasion?"

"They never asked me, Mr. Camperdown."

"It is all as clear as a pikestaff, John," said the lawyer.

"Quite clear, I should say," replied Mr. Eustace.

"And I suppose I may go," said Lizzie, rising from her chair.

There was no reason why she should not go; and, indeed, now that the
interview was over, there did not seem to be any reason why she should
have come. Though they had heard so much from her own mouth, they knew no
more than they had known before. The great mystery had been elucidated,
and Lizzie Eustace had been found to be the intriguing villain; but it was
quite clear, even to Mr. Camperdown, that nothing could be done to her. He
had never really thought that it would be expedient that she should be
prosecuted for perjury, and he now found that she must go utterly
scatheless, although, by her obstinacy and dishonesty, she had inflicted
so great a loss on the distinguished family which had taken her to its
bosom.

"I have no reason for wishing to detain you, Lady Eustace," he said. "If I
were to talk forever, I should not, probably, make you understand the
extent of the injury you have done, or teach you to look in a proper light
at the position in which you have placed yourself. When your husband died,
good advice was given you, and given, I think, in a very kind way. You
would not listen to it, and you see the result."

"I ain't a bit ashamed of anything," said Lizzie.

"I suppose not," rejoined Mr. Camperdown.

"Good-by, John." And Lizzie put out her hand to her brother-in-law.

"Good-by, Lizzie."

"Mr. Camperdown, I have the honour to wish you good-morning." Lizzie made
a low courtesy to the lawyer, and was then attended to her carriage by the
lawyer's clerk. She had certainly come forth from the interview without
fresh wounds.

"The barrister who will have the cross-examining of her at the Central
Criminal Court," said Mr. Camperdown, as soon as the door was closed
behind her, "will have a job of work on his hands. There's nothing a
pretty woman can't do when she's got rid of all sense of shame."

"She is a very great woman," said John Eustace, "a very great woman; and,
if the sex could have its rights, would make an excellent lawyer." In the
mean time Lizzie Eustace returned home to Hertford Street in triumph.




CHAPTER LXXIII

LIZZIE'S LAST LOVER


Lizzie's interview with the lawyer took place on the Wednesday afternoon,
and, on her return to Hertford Street she found a note from Mrs.
Carbuncle.

"I have made arrangements for dining out to-day, and shall not return till
after ten. I will do the same to-morrow, and on every day till you leave
town, and you can breakfast in your own room. Of course you will carry out
your plan for leaving this house on Monday. After what has passed, I shall
prefer not to meet you again.

"J. C."

 And this was written by a woman who, but a few days since, had borrowed
£150 from her, and who at this moment had in her hands fifty pounds' worth
of silver-plate, supposed to have been given to Lucinda, and which clearly
ought to have been returned to the donor, when Luanda's marriage was
postponed--as the newspapers had said. Lucinda, at this time, had left the
house in Hertford Street, but Lizzie had not been informed whither she had
been taken. She could not apply to Lucinda for restitution of the silver,
which was, in fact, held at that moment by the Albemarle Street hotel-
keeper as part security for his debt; and she was quite sure that any
application to Mrs. Carbuncle for either the silver or the debt would be
unavailing. But she might, perhaps, cause annoyance by a letter, and
could, at any rate, return insult for insult. She therefore wrote to her
late friend.

"MADAM: I certainly am not desirous of continuing an acquaintance into
which I was led by false representations, and in the course of which I
have been almost absurdly hospitable to persons altogether unworthy of my
kindness. Yourself and niece, and your especial friend, Lord George
Carruthers, and that unfortunate young man, your niece's lover, were
entertained at my country-house, as my guests, for some months. I am here,
in my own right, by arrangement; and, as I pay more than a proper share of
the expense of the establishment, I shall stay as long as I please, and go
when I please.

"In the mean time, as we are about to part, certainly forever, I must beg
you at once to repay me the sum of £150, which you have borrowed from me;
and I must also insist on your letting me have back the present of silver
which was prepared for your niece's marriage. That you should retain it as
a perquisite for yourself cannot for a moment be thought of, however
convenient it might be to yourself.

"Yours, etc.,

"E. EUSTACE."

As far as the application for restitution went, or indeed in regard to the
insult, she might as well have written to a milestone. Mrs. Carbuncle was
much too strong, and had fought her battle with the world much too long,
to regard such word-pelting as that. She paid no attention to the note,
and as she had come to terms with the agent of the house by which she was
to evacuate it on the following Monday, a fact which was communicated to
Lizzie by the servant, she did not much regard Lizzie's threat to remain
there. She knew, moreover, that arrangements were already being made for
the journey to Scotland.

Lizzie had come back from the attorney's chambers in triumph, and had been
triumphant when she wrote her note to Mrs. Carbuncle; but her elation was
considerably repressed by a short notice which she read in the fashionable
evening paper of the day. She always took the fashionable evening paper,
and had taught herself to think that life without it was impossible. But
on this afternoon she quarrelled with that fashionable evening paper
forever. The popular and well-informed organ of intelligence in question
informed its readers, that the Eustace diamonds--etc., etc. In fact, it
told the whole story; and then expressed a hope that, as the matter had
from the commencement been one of great interest to the public, who had
sympathised with Lady Eustace deeply as to the loss of her diamonds, Lady
Eustace would be able to explain that part of her conduct which certainly,
at present, was quite unintelligible. Lizzie threw the paper from her with
indignation, asking what right newspaper scribblers could have to
interfere with the private affairs of such persons as herself.

But on this evening the question of her answer to Lord Fawn was the one
which most interested her. Lord Fawn had taken long in the writing of his
letter, and she was justified in taking what time she pleased in answering
it; but, for her own sake, it had better be answered quickly. She had
tried her hand at two different replies, and did not at all doubt but what
she would send the affirmative answer, if she were sure that these latter
discoveries would not alter Lord Fawn's decision. Lord Fawn had distinctly
told her that, if she pleased, he would marry her. She would please;
having been much troubled by the circumstances of the past six months. But
then, was it not almost a certainty that Lord Fawn would retreat from his
offer on learning the facts which were now so well known as to have been
related in the public papers? She thought that she would take one more
night to think of it.

Alas; she took one night too many. On the next morning, while she was
still in bed, a letter was brought to her from Lord Fawn, dated from his
club the preceding evening.

"Lord Fawn presents his compliments to Lady Eustace. Lady Eustace will be
kind enough to understand that Lord Fawn recedes altogether from the
proposition made by him in his letter to Lady Eustace dated March 28th
last. Should Lady Eustace think proper to call in question the propriety
of this decision on the part of Lord Fawn, she had better refer the
question to some friend, and Lord Fawn will do the same. Lord Fawn thinks
it best to express his determination, under no circumstances, to
communicate again personally with Lady Eustace on this subject, or, as far
as he can see at present, on any other."

The letter was a blow to her, although she had felt quite certain that
Lord Fawn would have no difficulty in escaping from her hands as soon as
the story of the diamonds should be made public. It was a blow to her,
although she had assured herself a dozen times that a marriage with such a
one as Lord Fawn, a man who had not a grain of poetry in his composition,
would make her unutterably wretched. What escape would her heart have had
from itself in such a union? This question she had asked herself over and
over again, and there had been no answer to it. But then why had she not
been beforehand with Lord Fawn? Why had she not rejected his second offer
with the scorn which such an offer deserved? Ah, there was her misfortune;
there was her fault!

But, with Lizzie Eustace, when she could not do a thing which it was
desirable that she should be known to have done, the next consideration
was whether she could not so arrange as to seem to have done it. The
arrival of Lord Fawn's note just as she was about to write to him was
unfortunate. But she would still write to him, and date her letter before
the time that his was dated. He probably would not believe her date. She
hardly ever expected to be really believed by anybody. But he would have
to read what she wrote; and writing on this pretence, she would avoid the
necessity of alluding to his last letter.

Neither of the notes which she had by her quite suited the occasion, so
she wrote a third. The former letter in which she declined his offer was,
she thought, very charmingly insolent, and the allusion to his lordship's
scullion would have been successful, had it been sent on the moment, but
now a graver letter was required; and the graver letter, the date of
which, it will be observed, was the day previous to the morning on which
she had received Lord Fawn's last note, was as follows:

"HERTFORD ST., Wednesday, April 3.

"MY LORD: I have taken a week to answer the letter which your lordship has
done me the honour of writing to me, because I have thought it best to
have time for consideration in a matter of such importance. In this I have
copied your lordship's official caution.

"I think I never read a letter so false, so unmanly, and so cowardly, as
that which you have found yourself capable of sending to me.

"You became engaged to me when, as I admit with shame, I did not know your
character. You have since repudiated me and vilified my name, simply
because, having found that I had enemies, and being afraid to face them,
you wished to escape from your engagement. It has been cowardice from the
beginning to the end. Your whole conduct to me has been one long,
unprovoked insult, studiously concocted, because you have feared that
there might possibly be some trouble for you to encounter. Nobody ever
heard of anything so mean, either in novels or in real life.

"And now you again offer to marry me--because you are again afraid. You
think you will be thrashed, I suppose, if you decline to keep your
engagement; and feel that if you offer to go on with it, my friends cannot
beat you. You need not be afraid. No earthly consideration would induce me
to be your wife. And if any friend of mine should look at you as though he
meant to punish you, you can show him this letter, and make him understand
that it is I who have refused to be your wife, and not you who have
refused to be my husband.

"E. EUSTACE."

This epistle Lizzie did send, believing she could add nothing to its
insolence, let her study it as she might. And she thought, as she read it
for the fifth time, that it sounded as though it had been written before
her receipt of the final note from himself, and that it would, therefore,
irritate him the more.

This was to be the last week of her sojourn in town, and then she was to
go down and bury herself at Portray, with no other companionship than that
of the faithful Macnulty, who had been left in Scotland for the last three
months as nurse-in-chief to the little heir. She must go and give her
evidence before the magistrate on Friday, as to which she had already
received an odious slip of paper--but Frank would accompany her. Other
misfortunes had passed off so lightly that she hardly dreaded this. She
did not quite understand why she was to be so banished, and thought much
on the subject. She had submitted herself to Frank's advice when first she
had begun to fear that her troubles would be insuperable. Her troubles
were now disappearing; and, as for Frank--what was Frank to her, that she
should obey him? Nevertheless, her trunks were being already packed, and
she knew that she must go. He was to accompany her on her journey, and she
would still have one more chance with him.

As she was thinking of all this, Mr. Emilius, the clergyman, was
announced. In her loneliness she was delighted to receive any visitor, and
she knew that Mr. Emilius would be at least courteous to her. When he had
seated himself, he at once began to talk about the misfortune of the
unaccomplished marriage, and in a very low voice hinted that from the
beginning to end there had been something wrong. He had always feared that
an alliance based on a footing that was so openly "pecuniary"--he declared
that the word pecuniary expressed his meaning better than any other
epithet--could not lead to matrimonial happiness. "We all know," said he,
"that our dear friend, Mrs. Carbuncle, had views of her own, quite
distinct from her niece's happiness. I have the greatest possible respect
for Mrs. Carbuncle, and I may say esteem; but it is impossible to live
long in any degree of intimacy with Mrs. Carbuncle without seeing that she
is--mercenary."

"Mercenary! indeed she is," said Lizzie.

"You have observed it? Oh, yes; it is so, and it casts a shadow over a
character which otherwise has so much to charm."

"She is the most insolent and the most ungrateful woman that I ever heard
of!" exclaimed Lizzie with energy. Mr. Emilius opened his eyes, but did
not contradict her assertion. "As you have mentioned her name, Mr.
Emilius, I must tell you. I have done everything for that woman. You know
how I treated her down in Scotland."

"With a splendid hospitality," said Mr. Emilius.

"Of course she did not pay for anything there."

"Oh, no!" The idea of any one being called upon to pay for what one ate
and drank at a friend's house was peculiarly painful to Mr. Emilius.

"And I have paid for everything here. That is to say, we have made an
arrangement, very much in her favour. And she has borrowed large sums of
money from me."

"I am not at all surprised at that," said Mr. Emilius.

"And when that poor unfortunate girl, her niece, was to be married to poor
Sir Griffin Tewett, I gave her a whole service of plate."

"What unparalleled generosity!"

"Would you believe she has taken the whole for her own base purposes? And
then what do you think she has done?"

"My dear Lady Eustace, hardly anything would astonish me."

Lizzie suddenly found a difficulty in describing to her friend the fact
that Mrs. Carbuncle was endeavouring to turn her out of the house, without
also alluding to her own troubles about the robbery. "She has actually
told me," she continued, "that I must leave the house without a day's
warning. But I believe the truth is, that she has run so much into debt
that she cannot remain!"

"I know that she is very much in debt, Lady Eustace."

"But she owed me some civility. Instead of that, she has treated me with
nothing but insolence. And why, do you think? It is all because I would
not allow her to take that poor, insane young woman to Portray Castle."

"You don't mean that she asked to go there?"

"She did, though."

"I never heard such impertinence in my life--never," said Mr. Emilius,
again opening his eyes and shaking his head.

"She proposed that I should ask them both down to Portray, for--for--of
course it would have been almost forever. I don't know how I should have
got rid of them. And that poor young woman is mad, you know-quite mad. She
never recovered herself after that morning. Oh, what I have suffered about
that unhappy marriage, and the cruel, cruel way in which Mrs. Carbuncle
urged it on. Mr. Emilius, you can't conceive the scenes which have been
acted in this house during the last month. It has been dreadful! I
wouldn't go through such a time again for anything that could be offered
to me. It has made me so ill that I am obliged to go down to Scotland to
recruit my health."

"I heard that you were going to Scotland, and I wished to have an
opportunity of saying just a word to you in private before you left." Mr.
Emilius had thought a good deal about this interview, and had prepared
himself for it with considerable care. He knew, with tolerable accuracy,
the whole story of the necklace, having discussed it with Mrs. Carbuncle,
who, as the reader will remember, had been told the tale by Lord George.
He was aware of the engagement with Lord Fawn, and of the growing intimacy
which had existed between Lord George and Lizzie. He had been watchful,
diligent, patient, and had at last become hopeful. When he learned that
his beloved was about to start for Scotland, he felt that it would be well
that he should strike a blow before she went. As to a journey down to
Ayrshire, that would be nothing to one so enamoured as was Mr. Emilius;
and he would not scruple to show himself at the castle door without
invitation. Whatever may have been his deficiencies, Mr. Emilius did not
lack the courage needed to carry such an enterprise as this to a happy
conclusion. As far as pluck and courage might serve a man, he was well
served by his own gifts. He could, without a blush, or a quiver in his
voice, have asked a duchess to marry him, with ten times Lizzie's income.
He had now considered deeply whether, with the view of prevailing, it
would be better that he should allude to the lady's trespasses in regard
to the diamonds, or that he should pretend to be in ignorance; and he had
determined that ultimate success might, with most probability, be achieved
by a bold declaration of the truth. "I know how desperately you must be in
want of some one to help you through your troubles, and I know also that
your grand lovers will avoid you because of what you have done, and
therefore you had better take me at once. Take me, and I'll bring you
through everything. Refuse me, and I'll crush you." Such were the
arguments which Mr. Emilius had determined to use, and such the language--
of course with some modifications. He was now commencing his work, and was
quite resolved to leave no stone unturned in carrying it to a successful
issue. He drew his chair nearer to Lizzie as he announced his desire for a
private interview, and leaned over towards her with his two hands closed
together between his knees. He was a dark, hookey-nosed, well-made man,
with an exuberance of greasy hair, who would have been considered handsome
by many women had there not been something, almost amounting to a squint,
amiss with one of his eyes. When he was preaching it could hardly be seen,
but in the closeness of private conversation it was disagreeable.

"Oh, indeed;" said Lizzie, with a look of astonishment, perfectly well-
assumed. She had already begun to consider whether, after all, Mr.
Emilius--would do.

"Yes; Lady Eustace; it is so. You and I have known each other now for many
months, and I have received the most unaffected pleasure from the
acquaintance, may I not say from the intimacy, which has sprung up between
us?" Lizzie did not forbid the use of the pleasant word, but merely bowed.
"I think that as a devoted friend and a clergyman, I shall not be thought
to be intruding on private ground in saying that circumstances have made
me aware of the details of the robberies by which you have been so cruelly
persecuted." So the man had come about the diamonds and not to make an
offer! Lizzie raised her eyebrows, and bowed her head with the slightest
possible motion. "I do not know how far your friends or the public may
condemn you, but----"

"My friends don't condemn me at all, sir."

"I am so glad to hear it!"

"Nobody has dared to condemn me except this impudent woman here, who wants
an excuse for not paying me what she owes me."

"I am delighted. I was going to explain that although I am aware you have
infringed the letter of the law, and made yourself liable to proceedings
which may, perhaps, be unpleasant----"

"I ain't liable to anything unpleasant at all, Mr. Emilius."

"Then my mind is greatly relieved. I was about to remark, having heard in
the outer world that there were those who ventured to accuse you of--of
perjury----"

"Nobody has dared to accuse me of anything. What makes you come here and
say such things?"

"Ah, Lady Eustace. It is because these calumnies are spoken so openly
behind your back."

"Who speaks them? Mrs. Carbuncle and Lord George Carruthers, my enemies."

Mr. Emilius was beginning to feel that he was not making progress. "I was
on the point of observing to you that, according to the view of the matter
which I as a clergyman have taken, you were altogether justified in the
steps which you took for the protection of property which was your own,
but which had been attacked by designing persons."

"Of course I was justified," said Lizzie.

"You know best, Lady Eustace, whether any assistance I can offer will
avail you anything."

"I don't want any assistance, Mr. Emilius, thank you."

"I certainly have been given to understand that they who ought to stand by
you with the closest devotion have, in this period of what I may, perhaps,
call--tribulation, deserted your side with cold selfishness."

"But there isn't any tribulation, and nobody has deserted my side."

"I was told that Lord Fawn----"

"Lord Fawn is an idiot."

"Quite so; no doubt."

"And I have deserted him. I wrote to him this very morning in answer to a
pressing letter from him to renew our engagement, to tell him that that
was out of the question. I despise Lord Fawn, and my heart never can be
given where my respect does not accompany it."

"A noble sentiment, Lady Eustace, which I reciprocate completely. And now,
to come to what I may call the inner purport of my visit to you this
morning--the sweet cause of my attendance on you--let me assure you that I
should not now offer you my heart unless with my heart went the most
perfect respect and esteem which any man ever felt for a woman." Mr.
Emilius had found the necessity of coming to the point by some direct
road, as the lady had refused to allow him to lead up to it in the manner
he had proposed to himself. He still thought that what he had said might
be efficacious, as he did not for a moment believe her assertions as to
her own friends and the nonexistence of any trouble as to the oaths which
she had falsely sworn; but she carried the matter with a better courage
than he had expected to find, and drove him out of his intended line of
approach. He had, however, seized his opportunity without losing much
time.

"What on earth do you mean, Mr. Emilius?"

"I mean to lay my heart, my hand, my fortunes, my profession, my career at
your feet. I make bold to say of myself that I have, by my own unaided
eloquence and intelligence, won for myself a great position in this
swarming metropolis. Lady Eustace, I know your great rank. I feel your
transcendent beauty, ah, too acutely. I have been told that you are rich;
but I, myself, who venture to approach you as a suitor for your hand, am
also somebody in the world. The blood that runs in my veins is as
illustrious as your own, having descended to me from the great and ancient
nobles of my native country. The profession which I have adopted is the
grandest which ever filled the heart of man with aspirations. I have
barely turned my thirty-second year, and I am known as the greatest
preacher of my day, though I preach in a language which is not my own.
Your House of Lords would be open to me as a spiritual peer would I
condescend to come to terms with those who crave the assistance which I
could give them. I can move the masses. I can touch the hearts of men. And
in this great assemblage of mankind which you call London, I can choose my
own society, among the highest of the land. Lady Eustace, will you share
with me my career and my fortunes? I ask you because you are the only
woman whom my heart has stooped to love."

The man was a nasty, greasy, lying, squinting Jew preacher; an impostor,
over forty years of age, whose greatest social success had been achieved
when, through the agency of Mrs. Carbuncle, he made his way into Portray
Castle. He was about as near an English mitre as had been that great man
of a past generation, the Deputy Shepherd. He was a creature to loathe,
because he was greasy and a liar and an impostor. But there was a certain
manliness in him. He was not afraid of the woman; and in pleading his
cause with her he could stand up for himself courageously. He had studied
his speech, and having studied it he knew how to utter the words. He did
not blush nor stammer nor cringe. Of grandfather or grandmother belonging
to himself he had probably never heard, but he could so speak of his noble
ancestors as to produce belief in Lizzie's mind; and almost succeeded in
convincing her that he was, by the consent of mankind, the greatest
preacher of the day. While he was making his speech she almost liked his
squint. She certainly liked the grease and nastiness. Presuming, as she
naturally did, that something of what he said was false, she liked the
lies. There was a dash of poetry about him; and poetry, as she thought,
was not compatible, with humdrum truth. A man, to be a man in her eyes,
should be able to swear that all his geese are swans; should be able to
reckon his swans by the dozen, though he have not a feather belonging to
him, even from a goose's wing. She liked his audacity; and then when he
was making love he was not afraid of talking out boldly about his heart.
Nevertheless he was only Mr. Emilius the clergyman; and she had means of
knowing that his income was not generous. Though she admired his manner
and his language, she was quite aware that he was in pursuit of her money;
and, from the moment in which she first understood his object, she was
resolved that she would never become the wife of Mr. Emilius as long as
there was a hope as to Frank Greystock.

"I was told, Mr. Emilius," she said, "that you, some time since, had a
wife."

"It was a falsehood, Lady Eustace. From motives of pure charity I gave a
home to a distant cousin. I was then in a land of strangers, and my life
was misinterpreted. I made no complaint, but sent the lady back to her
native country. My compassion could supply her wants there as well as
here."

"Then you still support her?"

Mr. Emilius, thinking there might be danger in asserting that he was
subject to such an encumbrance, replied, "I did do so, till she found a
congenial home as the wife of an honest man."

"Oh, indeed. I'm quite glad to hear that."

"And now, Lady Eustace, may I venture to hope for a favourable answer?"

Upon this, Lizzie made him a speech as long, and almost as well-turned, as
her own. Her heart had of late been subject to many vicissitudes. She had
lost the dearest husband that a woman had ever worshipped. She had
ventured, for purposes with reference to her child, which she could not
now explain, to think once again of matrimony with a person of high rank,
who had turned out to be unworthy of her. She had receded (Lizzie, as she
said this, acted the part of receding, with a fine expression of scornful
face) and after that she was unwilling to entertain any further idea of
marriage. Upon hearing this, Mr. Emilius bowed low, and before the street
door was closed against him had begun to calculate how much a journey to
Scotland would cost him.




CHAPTER LXXIV

LIZZIE AT THE POLICE-COURT


On the Wednesday and Thursday Lizzie had been triumphant; for she had
certainly come out unscathed from Mr. Camperdown's chambers, and a lady
may surely be said to triumph when a gentleman lays his hand, his heart,
his fortunes, and all that he has got, at her feet; but when the Friday
came, though she was determined to be brave, her heart did sink within her
bosom. She understood well that she would be called upon to admit in
public the falseness of the oaths she had sworn upon two occasions; and
that, though she would not be made amenable to any absolute punishment for
her perjury, she would be subject to very damaging remarks from the
magistrate, and, probably, also from some lawyers employed to defend the
prisoners. She went to bed in fairly good spirits, but in the morning she
was cowed and unhappy. She dressed herself from head to foot in black, and
prepared for herself a heavy black veil. She had ordered from the livery-
stable a brougham for the occasion, thinking it wise to avoid the display
of her own carriage. She breakfasted early, and then took a large glass of
wine to support her. When Frank called for her, at a quarter to ten, she
was quite ready, and grasped his hand almost without a word. But she
looked into his face with her eyes filled with tears.

"It will soon be over," he said. She pressed his hand, and made him a
sign, to show that she was ready to follow him to the door. "The case will
come on at once," he said, "so that you will not be kept waiting."

"Oh, you are so good; so good to me." She pressed his arm, and did not
speak again till they reached the police-court.

There was a great crowd about the office, which was in a little by-street,
and so circumstanced that Lizzie's brougham could hardly make its way up
to the door. But way was at once made for her when Frank handed her out of
it, and the policemen about the place were as courteous to her as though
she had been the Lord Chancellor's wife. Evil-doing will be spoken of with
bated breath and soft words even by policemen, when the evildoer comes in
a carriage and with a title. Lizzie was led at once into a private room,
and told that she would be kept there only a very few minutes. Frank made
his way into the court and found that two magistrates had just seated
themselves on the bench. One would have sufficed for the occasion; but
this was a case of great interest, and even police-magistrates are human
in their interests. Greystock was allowed to get round to the bench and
whisper a word or two to the gentleman who was to preside. The magistrate
nodded his head, and the case began.

The unfortunate Mr. Benjamin had been sent back in durance vile from
Vienna, and was present in the court. With him, as joint malefactor, stood
Mr. Smiler, the great housebreaker, a huge, ugly, resolute-looking
scoundrel, possessed of enormous strength, who was very intimately known
to the police, with whom he had had various dealings since he had been
turned out upon the town to earn his bread some fifteen years before.
Indeed, long before that he had known the police--as far as his memory
went back he had always known them. But the sportive industry of his
boyish years was not now counted up against him. In the last fifteen years
his biography had been written with all the accuracy due to the
achievements of a great man; and during those hundred and eighty months he
had spent over one hundred in prison, and had been convicted twenty-three
times. He was now growing old, as a thief, and it was thought by his
friends that he would be settled for life in some quiet retreat. Mr.
Benjamin was a very respectable-looking man of about fifty, with slightly
grizzled hair, with excellent black clothes, and showing, by a surprised
air, his astonishment at finding himself in such a position. He spoke
constantly, both to his attorney and to the barrister who was to show
cause why he should not be committed, and throughout the whole morning was
very busy. Smiler, who was quite at home, and who understood his position,
never said a word to any one. He stood, perfectly straight, looking at the
magistrate, and never for a moment leaning on the rail before him during
the four hours that the case consumed. Once, when his friend, Billy Cann,
was brought into court to give evidence against him, dressed up to the
eyes, serene and sleek, as when we saw him once before at the "Rising
Sun," in Meek Street, Smiler turned a glance upon him which, to the eyes
of all present, contained a threat of most bloody revenge. But Billy knew
the advantages of his situation, and nodded at his old comrade, and
smiled. His old comrade was very much stronger than he, and possessed of
many natural advantages; but, perhaps, upon the whole, his old comrade had
been the less intelligent thief of the two. It was thus that the by-
standers read the meaning of Billy's smile.

The case was opened very shortly and very clearly by the gentleman who was
employed for the prosecution. It would all, he said, have lain in a nut-
shell, had it not been complicated by a previous robbery at Carlisle. Were
it necessary, he said, there would be no difficulty in convicting the
prisoners for that offence also, but it had been thought advisable to
confine the prosecution to the act of burglary committed in Hertford
Street. He stated the facts of what had happened at Carlisle, merely for
explanation, but would state nothing that could not be proven. Then he
told all that the reader knows about the iron box. But the diamonds were
not then in the box; and he told that story also, treating Lizzie with
great tenderness as he did so. Lizzie, all this time, was sitting behind
her veil in the private room, and did not hear a word of what was going
on. Then he came to the robbery in Hertford Street. He would prove by Lady
Eustace that the diamonds were left by her in a locked desk, were so
deposited, though all her friends believed them to have been taken at
Carlisle; and he would, moreover, prove by accomplices that they were
stolen by two men, the younger prisoner at the bar being one of them, and
the witness who would be adduced, the other; that they were given up by
these men to the elder prisoner, and that a certain sum had been paid by
him for the execution of the two robberies. There was much more of it; but
to the reader, who knows all, it would be but a thrice-told tale. He then
said that he first proposed to take the evidence of Lady Eustace, the lady
who had been in possession of the diamonds when they were stolen. Then
Frank Greystock left the court, and returned with poor Lizzie on his arm.

She was handed to a chair, and, after she was sworn, was told that she
might sit down; but she was requested to remove her veil, which she had
replaced as soon as she had kissed the book. The first question asked her
was very easy. Did she remember the night at Carlisle? Would she tell the
history of what occurred on that night? When the box was stolen, were the
diamonds in it? No; she had taken the diamonds out for security, and had
kept them under her pillow. Then came a bitter moment, in which she had to
confess her perjury before the Carlisle bench; but even that seemed to
pass off smoothly. The magistrate asked one severe question.

"Do you mean to say, Lady Eustace, that you gave false evidence on that
occasion, knowing it to be false?"

"I was in such a state, sir, from fear, that I did not know what I was
saying," exclaimed Lizzie, bursting into tears, and stretching forth
toward the bench her two clasped hands with the air of a suppliant.

From that moment the magistrate was altogether on her side, and so were
the public. Poor, ignorant, ill-used young creature; and then so lovely!
That was the general feeling. But she had not as yet come beneath the
harrow of that learned gentleman on the other side, whose best talents
were due to Mr. Benjamin. Then she told all she knew about the other
robbery. She certainly had not said, when examined on that occasion, that
the diamonds had then been taken. She had omitted to name the diamonds in
her catalogue of the things stolen; but she was sure that she had never
said that they were not then taken. She had said nothing about the
diamonds, knowing them to be her own, and preferring to lose them, to the
trouble of again referring to the night at Carlisle. Such was her evidence
for the prosecution, and then she was turned over to the very learned and
very acute gentleman whom Mr. Benjamin had hired for his defence, or
rather, to show cause why he should not be sent for trial.

It must be owned that poor Lizzie did receive from his hands some of that
punishment which she certainly deserved. This acute and learned gentleman
seemed to possess for the occasion the blandest and most dulcet voice that
ever was bestowed upon an English barrister. He addressed Lady Eustace
with the softest words, as though he hardly dared to speak to a woman so
eminent for wealth, rank, and beauty; but nevertheless he asked her some
very disagreeable questions.

"Was he to understand that she went of her own will before the bench of
magistrates at Carlisle, with the view of enabling the police to capture
certain persons for stealing certain jewels, while she knew that the
jewels were actually in her own possession?"

Lizzie, confounded by the softness of his voice as joined to the harshness
of the question, could hardly understand him, and he repeated it thrice,
becoming every time more and more mellifluous. "Yes," said Lizzie at last.

"Yes?" he asked.

"Yes," said Lizzie.

"Your ladyship did send the Cumberland police after men for stealing
jewels which were in your ladyship's own hands when you swore the
information?"

"Yes," said Lizzie.

"And your ladyship knew that the information was untrue?"

"Yes," said Lizzie.

"And the police were pursuing the men for many weeks?"

"Yes," said Lizzie.

"On your information?"

"Yes," said Lizzie, through her tears.

"And your ladyship knew, all the time, that the poor men were altogether
innocent of taking the jewels?"

"But they took the box," said Lizzie, through her tears.

"Yes," said the acute and learned gentleman, "somebody took your
ladyship's iron box out of the room, and you swore that the diamonds had
been taken. Was it not the fact that legal proceedings were being taken
against you for the recovery of the diamonds by persons who claimed the
property?"

"Yes," said Lizzie.

"And these persons withdrew their proceedings as soon as they heard that
the diamonds had been stolen?"

Soft as he was in his manner, he nearly reduced Lizzie Eustace to
fainting. It seemed to her that the questions would never end. It was in
vain that the magistrate pointed out to the learned gentleman that Lady
Eustace had confessed her own false swearing, both at Carlisle and in
London, a dozen times, for he continued his questions over and over again,
harping chiefly on the affair at Carlisle, and saying very little as to
the second robbery in Hertford Street. His idea was to make it appear that
Lizzie had arranged the robbery with the view of defrauding Mr.
Camperdown, and that Lord George Carruthers, was her accomplice. He even
asked her, almost in a whisper, and with the sweetest smile, whether she
was not engaged to marry Lord George. When Lizzie denied this, he still
suggested that some such alliance might be in contemplation. Upon this.
Frank Greystock called upon the magistrate to defend Lady Eustace from
such unnecessary vulgarity, and there was a scene in the court. Lizzie did
not like the scene, but it helped to protect her from the contemplation of
the public, who, of course, were much gratified by high words between two
barristers. Lady Eustace was forced to remain in the private room during
the examination of Patience Crabstick and Mr. Cann, and so did not hear
it. Patience was a most obdurate and difficult witness--extremely averse
to say evil of herself, and on that account unworthy of the good things
which she had received. But Billy Cann was charming--graceful,
communicative, and absolutely accurate. There was no shaking him. The
learned and acute gentleman who tried to tear him in pieces could do
nothing with him. He was asked whether he had not been a professional
thief for ten years.

"Ten or twelve," said he.

"Did he expect that any juryman would believe him on his oath?"

"Not unless I am fully corroborated."

"Can you look that man in the face--that man who is at any rate so much
honester than yourself?" asked the learned gentleman with pathos. Billy
said that he thought he could, and the way in which he smiled upon Smiler
caused a roar through the whole court.

The two men were, as a matter of course, committed for trial at the
Central Criminal Court, and Lizzie Eustace was bound by certain penalties
to come forward when called upon, and give her evidence again.

"I am glad that it is over," said Frank, as he left her at Mrs.
Carbuncle's hall door.

"Oh, Frank, dearest Frank, where should I be if it were not for you?"




CHAPTER LXXV

LORD GEORGE GIVES HIS REASONS


Lady Eustace did not leave the house during the Saturday and Sunday, and
engaged herself exclusively with preparing for her journey. She had no
further interview with Mrs. Carbuncle, but there were messages between
them, and even notes were written. They resulted in nothing. Lizzie was
desirous of getting back the spoons and forks, and, if possible, some of
her money. The spoons and forks were out of Mrs. Carbuncle's power--in
Albemarle Street--and the money had, of course, been spent. Lizzie might
have saved herself the trouble, had it not been that it was a pleasure to
her to insult her late friend, even though, in doing so, new insults were
heaped upon her own head. As for the trumpery spoons, they--so said Mrs.
Carbuncle--were the property of Miss Roanoke, having been made over to
her, unconditionally, long before the wedding, as a part of a separate
pecuniary transaction. Mrs. Carbuncle had no power of disposing of Miss
Roanoke's property. As to the money which Lady Eustace claimed, Mrs.
Carbuncle asserted that, when the final accounts should be made up between
them, it would be found that there was a considerable balance due to Mrs.
Carbuncle; but even were there anything due to Lady Eustace, Mrs.
Carbuncle would decline to pay it, as she was informed that all moneys
possessed by Lady Eustace were now confiscated to the Crown by reasons of
the PERJURIES--the word was doubly scored in Mrs. Carbuncle's note--which
Lady Eustace had committed. This, of course, was unpleasant; but Mrs.
Carbuncle did not have the honours of the battle all to herself. Lizzie
also said some unpleasant things which, perhaps, were the more unpleasant
because they were true. Mrs. Carbuncle had come pretty nearly to the end
of her career, whereas Lizzie's income, in spite of her perjuries, was
comparatively untouched. The undoubted mistress of Portray Castle, and
mother of the Sir Florian Eustace of the day, could still despise and look
down upon Mrs. Carbuncle, although she were known to have told fibs about
the family diamonds.

Lord George always came to Hertford Street on a Sunday, and Lady Eustace
left word for him, with the servant, that she would be glad to see him
before her journey into Scotland. "Goes to-morrow, does she?" said Lord
George to the servant. "Well, I'll see her." And he was shown up to her
room before he went to Mrs. Carbuncle.

Lizzie, in sending for him, had some half-formed idea of a romantic
farewell. The man, she thought, had behaved very badly to her; had
accepted very much from her hands, and had refused to give her anything in
return; had become the first repository of her great secret, and had
placed no mutual confidence in her. He had been harsh to her, and unjust;
and then, too, he had declined to be in love with her! She was full of
spite against Lord George, and would have been glad to injure him; but,
nevertheless, there would be some excitement in a farewell, in which some
mock affection might be displayed--and she would have an opportunity of
abusing Mrs. Carbuncle.

"So you are off to-morrow?" said Lord George, taking his place on the rug
before her fire, and looking down at her with his head a little on one
side. Lizzie's anger against the man chiefly arose from a feeling that he
treated her with all a Corsair's freedom without any of a Corsair's
tenderness. She could have forgiven the want of deferential manner, had
there been any devotion--but Lord George was both impudent and
indifferent.

"Yes," she said. "Thank goodness, I shall get out of this frightful place
to-morrow, and soon have once more a roof of my own over my head. What an
experience I have had since I have been here!"

"We have all had an experience," said Lord George, still looking at her
with that half-comic turn of his face--almost as though he were
investigating some curious animal of which so remarkable a specimen had
never before come under his notice.

"No woman ever intended to show a more disinterested friendship than I
have done; and what has been my return?"

"You mean to me--disinterested friendship to me?" And Lord George tapped
his breast lightly with his fingers. His head was still a little on one
side, and there was still the smile upon his face.

"I was alluding particularly to Mrs. Carbuncle."

"Lady Eustace, I cannot take charge of Mrs. Carbuncle's friendships. I
have enough to do to look after my own. If you have any complaint to make
against me, I will at least listen to it."

"God knows I do not want to make complaints," said Lizzie, covering her
face with her hands.

"They don't do much good--do they? It's better to take people as you find
'em, and then make the best of 'em. They're a queer lot, ain't they--the
sort of people one meets about in the world?"

"I don't know what you mean by that, Lord George."

"Just what you were saying when you talked of your experiences. These
experiences do surprise one. I have knocked about the world a great deal,
and would have almost said that nothing would surprise me. You are no more
than a child to me, but you have surprised me."

"I hope I have not injured you, Lord George."

"Do you remember how you rode to hounds the day your cousin took that
other man's horse? That surprised me."

"Oh, Lord George, that was the happiest day of my life. How little
happiness there is for people!"

"And when Tewett got that girl to say she'd marry him, the coolness with
which you bore all the abomination of it in your house--for people who
were nothing to you; that surprised me!"

"I meant to be so kind to you all."

"And when I found that you always travelled with ten thousand pounds'
worth of diamonds in a box, that surprised me very much. I thought that
you were a very dangerous companion."

"Pray don't talk about the horrid necklace."

"Then came the robbery, and you seemed to lose your diamonds without being
at all unhappy about them. Of course, we understand that now." On hearing
this, Lizzie smiled, but did not say a word. "Then I perceived that I--I
was supposed to be the thief. You--you yourself couldn't have suspected me
of taking the diamonds, because--because you'd got them, you know, all
safe in your pocket. But you might as well own the truth now. Didn't you
think that it was I who stole the box?"

"I wish it had been you," said Lizzie laughing.

"All that surprised me. The police were watching me every day as a cat
watches a mouse, and thought that they surely had got the thief when they
found that I had dealings with Benjamin. Well, you--you were laughing at
me in your sleeve all the time."

"Not laughing, Lord George."

"Yes, you were. You had got the kernel yourself, and thought that I had
taken all the trouble to crack the nut and had found myself with nothing
but the shell. Then, when you found you couldn't eat the kernel, that you
couldn't get rid of the swag without assistance, you came to me to help
you. I began to think then that you were too many for all of us. By Jove,
I did! Then I heard of the second robbery, and, of course, I thought you
had managed that too."

"Oh, no," said Lizzie.

"Unfortunately you didn't; but I thought you did. And you thought that I
had done it! Mr. Benjamin was too clever for us both, and now he is going
to have penal servitude for the rest of his life. I wonder who will be the
better of it all. Who'll have the diamonds at last?"

"I do not in the least care. I hate the diamonds. Of course I would not
give them up, because they were my own."

"The end seems to be that you have lost your property, and sworn ever so
many false oaths, and have brought all your friends into trouble, and have
got nothing by it. What was the good of being so clever?"

"You need not come here to tease me, Lord George."

"I came here because you sent for me. There's my poor friend Mrs.
Carbuncle, declares that all her credit is destroyed, and her niece unable
to marry, and her house taken away from her--all because of her connection
with you."

"Mrs. Carbuncle is--is--is--. Oh, Lord George, don't you know what she
is?"

"I know that Mrs. Carbuncle is in a very bad way, and that that girl has
gone crazy, and that poor Griff has taken himself off to Japan, and that I
am so knocked about that I don't know where to go; and somehow it seems
all to have come from your little manoeuvres. You see we have all of us
been made remarkable; haven't we?"

"You are always remarkable, Lord George."

"And it is all your doing. To be sure you have lost your diamonds for your
pains. I wouldn't mind it so much if anybody were the better for it. I
shouldn't have begrudged even Benjamin the pull, if he'd got it."

He stood there, still looking down upon her, speaking with a sarcastic
submissive tone, and, as she felt, intending to be severe to her. Though
she believed that she hated him, she would have liked to get up some show
of an affectionate farewell; some scene, in which there might have been
tears, and tenderness, and poetry, and perhaps a parting caress; but with
his jeering words and sneering face, he was as hard as a rock. He was now
silent, but still looking down upon her as he stood motionless on the rug,
so that she was compelled to speak again. "I sent for you, Lord George,
because I did not like the idea of parting with you forever, without one
word of adieu."

"You are going to tear yourself away, are you?"

"I am going to Portray on Monday."

"And never coming back any more? You'll be up here before the season is
over, with fifty more wonderful schemes in your little head. So Lord Fawn
is done with, is he?"

"I have told Lord Fawn that nothing shall induce me ever to see him
again."

"And cousin Frank?"

"My cousin attends me down to Scotland."

"Oh--h. That makes it altogether another thing. He attends you down to
Scotland, does he? Does Mr. Emilius go too?"

"I believe you are trying to insult me, sir."

"You can't expect but what a man should be a little jealous, when he has
been so completely cut out himself. There was a time, you know, when even
cousin Frank wasn't a better fellow than myself."

"Much you thought about it, Lord George."

"Well--I did. I thought about it a good deal, my lady. And I liked the
idea of it very much." Lizzie pricked up her ears. In spite of all his
harshness, could it be that he should be the Corsair still? "I am a
rambling, uneasy, ill-to-do sort of man, but still I thought about it. You
are pretty, you know--uncommonly pretty."

"Don't, Lord George."

"And I'll acknowledge that the income goes for much. I suppose that's real
at any rate?"

"Well--I hope so. Of course it's real. And so is the prettiness, Lord
George--if there is any."

"I never doubted that, Lady Eustace. But when it came to my thinking that
you had stolen the diamonds, and you thinking that I had stolen the
box----! I'm not a man to stand on trifles, but, by George! it wouldn't do
then."

"Who wanted it to do?" said Lizzie. "Go away. You are very unkind to me. I
hope I may never see you again. I believe you care more for that odious
vulgar woman down-stairs than you do for anybody else in the world."

"Ah, dear! I have known her for many years, Lizzie, and that both covers
and discovers many faults. One learns to know how bad one's old friends
are, but then one forgives them, because they are old friends."

"You can't forgive me--because I'm bad, and only a new friend."

"Yes, I will. I forgive you all, and hope you may do well yet. If I may
give you one bit of advice at parting, it is to caution you against being
clever when there is nothing to get by it."

"I ain't clever at all," said Lizzie, beginning to whimper.

"Good-by, my dear."

"Good-by," said Lizzie. He took her hand in one of his; patted her on the
head with the other, as though she had been a child, and then left her.




CHAPTER LXXVI

LIZZIE RETURNS TO SCOTLAND


Frank Greystock, the writer fears, will not have recommended himself to
those readers of this tale who think the part of lover to the heroine
should be always filled by a young man with heroic attributes. And yet the
young member for Bobsborough was by no means deficient in fine qualities,
and perhaps was quite as capable of heroism as the majority of barristers
and members of Parliament among whom he consorted, and who were to him the
world. A man born to great wealth may, without injury to himself or his
friends, do pretty nearly what he likes in regard to marriage, always
presuming that the wife he selects be of his own rank. He need not marry
for money, nor need he abstain from marriage because he can't support a
wife without money. And the very poor man, who has no pretension to rank
or standing, other than that which honesty may give him, can do the same.
His wife's fortune will consist in the labour of her hands, and in her
ability to assist him in his home. But between these there is a middle
class of men, who, by reason of their education, are peculiarly
susceptible to the charms of womanhood, but who literally cannot marry for
love, because their earnings will do no more than support themselves. As
to this special young man, it must be confessed that his earnings should
have done much more than that, but not the less did he find himself in a
position in which marriage with a penniless girl seemed to threaten him
and her with ruin. All his friends told Frank Greystock that he would be
ruined were he to marry Lucy Morris; and his friends were people supposed
to be very good and wise. The dean and the dean's wife, his father and
mother, were very clear that it would be so. Old Lady Linlithgow had
spoken of such a marriage as quite out of the question. The Bishop of
Bobsborough, when it was mentioned in his hearing, had declared that such
a marriage would be a thousand pities. And even dear old Lady Fawn, though
she wished it for Lucy's sake, had many times prophesied that such a thing
was quite impossible. When the rumour of the marriage reached Lady
Glencora, Lady Glencora told her friend Madame Max Goesler that that young
man was going to blow his brains out. To her thinking the two actions were
equivalent. It is only when we read of such men that we feel that truth to
his sweetheart is the first duty of man. I am afraid that it is not the
advice which we give to our sons.

But it was the advice which Frank Greystock had most persistently given to
himself since he had first known Lucy Morris. Doubtless he had vacillated,
but on the balance of his convictions as to his own future conduct he had
been much nobler than his friends. He had never hesitated for a moment as
to the value of Lucy Morris. She was not beautiful. She had no wonderful
gifts of nature. There was nothing of a goddess about her. She was
absolutely penniless. She had never been what the world calls well-
dressed. And yet she had been everything to him. There had grown up a
sympathy between them quite as strong on his part as on hers, and he had
acknowledged it to himself. He had never doubted his own love, and when he
had been most near to convincing himself that in his peculiar position he
ought to marry his rich cousin because of her wealth, then, at those
moments, he had most strongly felt that to have Lucy Morris close to him
was the greatest charm in existence. Hitherto his cousin's money, joined
to flatteries and caresses--which if a young man can resist he is almost
more than a young man--had tempted him; but he had combated the
temptation. On one memorable evening his love for Lucy had tempted him. To
that temptation he had yielded, and the letter by which he became engaged
to her had been written. He had never meant to evade it; had always told
himself that it should not be evaded; but gradually days had been added to
days, and months to months, and he had allowed her to languish without
seeing him, and almost without hearing from him.

She too had heard from all sides that she was deserted by him, and she had
written to him to give him back his troth; but she had not sent her
letters. She did not doubt that the thing was over--she hardly doubted;
and yet she would not send any letter. Perhaps it would be better that the
matter should be allowed to drop without any letter-writing. She would
never reproach him, though she would ever think him to be a traitor. Would
not she have starved herself for him? Could she so have served him? And
yet he could bear for her sake no touch of delay in his prosperity! Would
she not have been content to wait, and always to wait, so that he, with
some word of love, would have told her that he waited also? But he would
not only desert her, but would give himself to that false, infamous woman,
who was so wholly unfitted to be his wife. For Lucy, though to herself she
would call him a traitor, and would think him to be a traitor, still
regarded him as the best of mankind; as one who, in marrying such a one as
Lizzie Eustace, would destroy all his excellence, as a man might mar his
strength and beauty by falling into a pit. For Lizzie Eustace Lucy Morris
had now no forgiveness. Lucy had almost forgotten Lizzie's lies, and her
preferred bribe, and all her meanness, when she made that visit to
Hertford Street. Then when Lizzie claimed this man as her lover, a full
remembrance of all the woman's iniquities came back on Lucy's mind. The
statement that Lizzie then made Lucy did believe. She did think that
Frank, her Frank, the man whom she worshipped, was to take this harpy to
his bosom as his wife; and if it were to be so, was it not better that she
should be so told? But from that moment poor Lizzie's sins were ranker to
Lucy Morris than even to Mr. Camperdown or Mrs. Hittaway. She could not
refrain from saying a word even to old Lady Linlithgow. The countess had
called her niece a little liar.

"Liar!" said Lucy, "I do not think Satan himself can lie as she does."

"Heighty-tighty," said the countess. "I suppose, then, there's to be a
match between Lady Satan and her cousin Frank?"

"They can do as they like about that," said Lucy, walking out of the room.

Then came the paragraph in the fashionable evening newspaper; after that,
the report of the examination before the magistrate; and then certain
information that Lady Eustace was about to proceed to Scotland together
with her cousin, Mr. Greystock, the Member for Bobsborough. "It is a large
income," said the countess, "but, upon my word, she's dear at the money."
Lucy did not speak, but she bit her lip till the blood ran into her mouth.
She was going down to Fawn Court almost immediately, to stay there with
her old friends till she should be able to find some permanent home for
herself. Once, and once only, would she endure discussion, and then the
matter should be banished forever from her tongue.

Early on the appointed morning Frank Greystock, with a couple of cabs, was
at Mrs. Carbuncle's door in Hertford Street. Lizzie had agreed to start by
a very early train--at eight A. M.--so that she might get through to
Portray in one day. It had been thought expedient, both by herself and by
her cousin, that for the present there should be no more sleeping at the
Carlisle hotel. The robbery was probably still talked about in that
establishment; and the report of the proceedings at the police-court had
no doubt travelled as far north as the border city. It was to be a long
day, and could hardly be other than sad. Lizzie, understanding this,
feeling that, though she had been in a great measure triumphant over her
difficulties before the magistrate, she ought still to consider herself,
for a short while, as being under a cloud, crept down into the cab and
seated herself beside her cousin, almost without a word. She was again
dressed in black, and again wore the thick veil. Her maid, with the
luggage, followed them, and they were driven to Euston Square almost
without a word. On this occasion no tall footman accompanied them. "Oh,
Frank; dear Frank," she had said, and that was all. He had been active
about the luggage and useful in giving orders, but beyond his directions
and inquiries as to the journey he spoke not a word. Had she breakfasted?
Would she have a cup of tea at the station? Should he take any luncheon
for her? At every question she only looked into his face and shook her
head. All thoughts as to creature comforts were over with her now forever.
Tranquillity, a little poetry, and her darling boy, were all that she
needed for the short remainder of her sojourn upon earth. These were the
sentiments which she intended to convey when she shook her head and looked
up into his eyes. The world was over for her. She had had her day of
pleasure, and found how vain it was. Now she would devote herself to her
child. "I shall see my boy again to-night," she said, as she took her seat
in the carriage.

Such was the state of mind, or such, rather, the resolutions, with which
she commenced her journey. Should he become bright, communicative, and
pleasant, or even tenderly silent, or perhaps, now at length, affectionate
and demonstrative, she no doubt might be able to change as he changed. He
had been cousinly but gloomy at the police-court; in the same mood when he
brought her home; and, as she saw with the first glance of her eye, in the
same mood again when she met him in the hall this morning. Of course she
must play his tunes. Is it not the fate of women to play the tunes which
men dictate, except in some rare case in which the woman can make herself
the dictator? Lizzie loved to be a dictator; but at the present moment she
knew that circumstances were against her.

She watched him--so closely. At first he slept a good deal. He was never
in bed very early, and on this morning had been up at six. At Rugby he got
out and ate what he said was his breakfast. Would she not have a cup of
tea? Again she shook her head and smiled. She smiled as some women smile
when you offer them a third glass of champagne. "You are joking with me, I
know. You cannot think that I would take it." This was the meaning of
Lizzie's smile. He went into the refreshment-room, growled at the heat of
the tea and the abominable nastiness of the food provided, and then, after
the allotted five minutes, took himself to a smoking-carriage. He did not
rejoin his cousin till they were at Crewe. When he went back to his old
seat, she only smiled again. He asked her whether she had slept, and again
she shook her head. She had been repeating to herself the address to
Ianthe's soul, and her whole being was pervaded with poetry.

It was absolutely necessary, as he thought, that she should eat something,
and he insisted that she should dine upon the road, somewhere. He, of
course, was not aware that she had been nibbling biscuits and chocolate
while he had been smoking, and had had recourse even to the comfort of a
sherry flask which she carried in her dressing-bag. When he talked of
dinner she did more than smile and refuse. She expostulated. For she well
knew that the twenty minutes for dinner were allowed at the Carlisle
station; and even if there had been no chocolate and no sherry, she would
have endured on, even up to absolute inanition, rather than step out upon
this well-remembered platform. "You must eat, or you'll be starved," he
said. "I'll fetch you something." So he bribed a special waiter, and she
was supplied with cold chicken and more sherry. After this Frank smoked
again, and did not reappear till they had reached Dumfries.

Hitherto there had been no tenderness--nothing but the coldest cousinship.
He clearly meant her to understand that he had submitted to the task of
accompanying her back to Portray Castle as a duty, but that he had nothing
to say to one who had so misbehaved herself. This was very irritating. She
could have taken herself home to Portray without his company, and have
made the journey more endurable without him than with him, if this were to
be his conduct throughout. They had had the carriage to themselves all the
way from Crewe to Carlisle, and he had hardly spoken a word to her. If he
would have rated her soundly for her wickednesses, she could have made
something of that. She could have thrown herself on her knees, and
implored his pardon; or, if hard pressed, have suggested the propriety of
throwing herself out of the carriage-window. She could have brought him
round if he would only have talked to her, but there is no doing anything
with a silent man. He was not her master. He had no power over her. She
was the lady of Portray, and he could not interfere with her. If he
intended to be sullen with her to the end, and to show his contempt for
her, she would turn against him. "The worm will turn," she said to
herself. And yet she did not think herself a worm.

A few stations beyond Dumfries they were again alone. It was now quite
dark, and they had already been travelling over ten hours. They would not
reach their own station till eight, and then again there would be the
journey to Portray. At last he spoke to her.

"Are you tired, Lizzie?"

"Oh, so tired!"

"You have slept, I think?"

"No, not once; not a wink. You have slept." This she said in a tone of
reproach.

"Indeed I have."

"I have endeavoured to read, but one cannot command one's mind at all
times. Oh, I am so weary. Is it much farther? I have lost all reckoning as
to time and place."

"We change at the next station but one. It will soon be over now. Will you
have a glass of sherry? I have some in my flask." Again she shook her
head. "It is a long way down to Portray, I must own."

"Oh, I am so sorry that I have given you the trouble to accompany me."

"I was not thinking of myself. I don't mind it. It was better that you
should have somebody with you--just for this journey."

"I don't know why this journey should be different from any other," said
Lizzie crossly. She had not done anything that made it necessary that she
should be taken care of--like a naughty girl.

"I'll see you to the end of it now, anyway."

"And you'll stay a few days with me, Frank? You won't go away at once? Say
you'll stay a week. Dear, dear Frank; say you'll stay a week. I know that
the House doesn't meet for ever so long. Oh, Frank, I do so wish you'd be
more like yourself." There was no reason why she should not make one other
effort, and as she made it every sign of fatigue passed away from her.

"I'll stay over to-morrow certainly," he replied.

"Only one day!"

"Days with me mean money, Lizzie, and money is a thing which is at present
very necessary to me."

"I hate money."

"That's very well for you because you have plenty of it."

"I hate money. It is the only thing that one has that one cannot give to
those one loves. I could give you anything else--though it cost a thousand
pounds."

"Pray don't. Most people like presents, but they only bore me."

"Because you are so indifferent, Frank; so cold. Do you remember giving me
a little ring?"

"Very well indeed. It cost eight and sixpence."

"I never thought what it cost; but there it is." This she said drawing off
her glove and showing him her finger. "And when I am dead there it will
be. You say you want money, Frank. May I not give it you? Are not we
brother and sister?"

"My dear Lizzie, you say you hate money. Don't talk about it."

"It is you that talk about it. I only talk about it because I want to give
it you; yes, all that I have. When I first knew what was the real meaning
of my husband's will, my only thought was to be of assistance to you."

In real truth Frank was becoming very sick of her. It seemed to him now to
have been almost impossible that he should ever soberly have thought of
making her his wife. The charm was all gone, and even her prettiness had
in his eyes lost its value. He looked at her, asking himself whether in
truth she was pretty. She had been travelling all day, and perhaps the
scrutiny was not fair. But he thought that even after the longest day's
journey Lucy would not have been soiled, haggard, dishevelled, and
unclean, as was this woman.

Travellers again entered the carriage, and they went on with a crowd of
persons till they reached the platform at which they changed the carriage
for Troon. Then they were again alone, for a few minutes, and Lizzie with
infinite courage determined that she would make her last attempt. "Frank,"
she said, "you know what it is that I mean. You cannot feel that I am
ungenerous. You have made me love you. Will you have all that I have to
give?" She was leaning over close to him, and he was observing that her
long lock of hair was out of curl and untidy, a thing that ought not to
have been during such a journey as this.

"Do you not know," he said, "that I am engaged to marry Lucy Morris?"

"No; I do not know it."

"I have told you so more than once."

"You cannot afford to marry her."

"Then I shall do it without affording."

Lizzie was about to speak, had already pronounced her rival's name, in
that tone of contempt which she so well knew how to use, when he stopped
her. "Do not say anything against her, Lizzie, in my hearing, for I will
not bear it. It would force me to leave you at the Troon station, and I
had better see you now to the end of the journey." Lizzie flung herself
back into the corner of her carriage, and did not utter another word till
she reached Portray Castle. He handed her out of the railway carriage and
into her own vehicle which was waiting for them, attended to the maid, and
got the luggage; but still she did not speak. It would be better that she
should quarrel with him. That little snake Lucy would of course now tell
him of the meeting between them in Hertford Street, after which anything
but quarrelling would be impossible. What a fool the man must be, what an
idiot, what a soft-hearted, mean-spirited fellow! Lucy, by her sly, quiet
little stratagems, had got him once to speak the word, and now he had not
courage enough to go back from it! He had less strength of will even than
Lord Fawn! What she offered to him would be the making of him. With his
position, his seat in Parliament, such a country house as Portray Castle,
and the income which she would give him, there was nothing that he might
not reach! And he was so infirm of purpose that though he had hankered
after it all he would not open his hand to take it, because he was afraid
of such a little thing as Lucy Morris! It was thus that she thought of him
as she leaned back in the carriage without speaking. In giving her all
that is due to her we must acknowledge that she had less feeling of the
injury done to her charms as a woman than might have been expected. That
she hated Lucy was a matter of course; and equally so that she should be
very angry with Frank Greystock; but the anger arose from general
disappointment rather than from any sense of her own despised beauty. "Ah,
now I shall see my child," she said, as the carriage stopped at the castle
gate.

When Frank Greystock went to his supper Miss Macnulty brought to him his
cousin's compliments with a message saying that she was too weary to see
him again that night. The message had been intended to be curt and
uncourteous, but Miss Macnulty had softened it, so that no harm was done.
"She must be very weary," said Frank.

"I supposed though that nothing would ever really tire Lady Eustace," said
Miss Macnulty. "When she is excited nothing will tire her. Perhaps the
journey has been dull."

"Exceedingly dull!" said Frank, as he helped himself to the collops which
the Portray cook had prepared for his supper.

Miss Macnulty was very attentive to him and had many questions to ask.
About the necklace she hardly dared to speak, merely observing how sad it
was that all those precious diamonds should have been lost forever. "Very
sad indeed," said Frank with his mouth full. She then went on to the
marriage--the marriage that was no marriage. Was not that very dreadful?
Was it true that Miss Roanoke was really--out of her mind? Frank
acknowledged that it was dreadful, but thought that the marriage had it
been completed would have been more so. As for the young lady, he knew
only that she had been taken somewhere out of the way. Sir Griffin, he had
been told, had gone to Japan.

"To Japan!" said Miss Macnulty, really interested. Had Sir Griffin gone no
farther than Boulogne her pleasure in the news would certainly have been
much less. Then she asked some single question about Lord George, and from
that came to the real marrow of her anxiety. Had Mr. Greystock lately seen
the--the Rev. Mr. Emilius? Frank had not seen the clergyman, and could
only say of him that had Lucinda Roanoke and Sir Griffin Tewett been made
one, the knot would have been tied by Mr. Emilius.

"Would it indeed? Did you not think Mr. Emilius very clever when you met
him down here?"

"I don't doubt but what he is a sharp sort of fellow."

"Oh, Mr. Greystock, I don't think that that's the word for him at all. He
did promise me when he was here that he would write to me occasionally,
but I suppose that the increasing duties of his position have rendered
that impossible." Frank, who had no idea of the extent of the preacher's
ambition, assured Miss Macnulty that among his multifarious clerical
labours it was out of the question that Mr. Emilius should find time to
write letters.

Frank had consented to stay one day at Portray, and did not now like to
run away without again seeing his cousin. Though much tempted to go at
once, he did stay the day, and had an opportunity of speaking a few words
to Mr. Gowran. Mr. Gowran was very gracious, but said nothing of his
journey up to London. He asked various questions concerning her
"leddyship's" appearance at the police-court, as to which tidings had
already reached Ayrshire, and pretended to be greatly shocked at the loss
of the diamonds.

"When they talk o' ten thoosand poond that's a lee nae doobt?" asked Andy.

"No lie at all, I believe," said Greystock.

"And her leddyship wad tak' aboot wi' her ten thoosand poond in a box?"
Andy still showed much doubt by the angry glance of his eye and the close
compression of his lips and the great severity of his demeanour as he
asked the question.

"I know nothing about diamonds myself, but that is what they say they were
worth."

"Her leddyship her ain sell seems nae to ha' been in ain story aboot the
box, Muster Greystock?" But Frank could not stand to be cross-questioned
on this delicate matter, and walked off, saying that as the thieves had
not yet been tried for the robbery, the less said about it the better.

At four o'clock on that afternoon he had not seen Lizzie, and then he
received a message from her to the effect that she was still so unwell
from the fatigue of her journey that she could bear no one with her but
her child. She hoped that her cousin was quite comfortable, and that she
might be able to see him after breakfast on the following day. But Frank
was determined to leave Portray very early on the following day, and
therefore wrote a note to his cousin. He begged that she would not disturb
herself, that he would leave the castle the next morning before she could
be up, and that he had only further to remind her that she must come up to
London at once as soon as she should be summoned for the trial of Mr.
Benjamin and his comrade. It had seemed to Frank that she had almost
concluded that her labours connected with that disagreeable matter were at
end.

"The examination may be long, and I will attend you if you wish it," said
her cousin. Upon receiving this she thought it expedient to come down to
him, and there was an interview for about a quarter of an hour in her own
little sitting-room, looking out upon the sea. She had formed a project,
and at once suggested it to him. If she found herself ill when the day of
the trial came, could they make her go up and give her evidence? Frank
told her that they could and that they would. She was very clever about
it.

"They couldn't go back to what I said at Carlisle, you know; because they
already have made me tell all that myself." As she had been called upon to
criminate herself she could not now be tried for the crime. Frank,
however, would not listen to this, and told her that she must come. "Very
well, Frank. I know you like to have your own way. You always did. And you
think so little of my feelings? I shall make inquiry and if f must, why, I
suppose I must."

"You'd better make up your mind to come."

"Very well. And now, Frank, as I am so very tired, if you please, I'll say
good-by to you. I am very much obliged to you for coming with me. Good-
by." And so they parted.




CHAPTER LXXVII

THE STORY OF LUCY MORRIS IS CONCLUDED


On the day appointed, Lucy Morris went back from the house of the old
countess to Fawn Court. "My dear," said Lady Linlithgow, "I am sorry that
you are going. Perhaps you'll think I haven't been very kind to you, but I
never am kind. People have always been hard to me, and I'm hard. But I do
like you."

"I'm glad you like me, as we have lived together so long."

"You may go on staying here, if you choose, and I'll try to make it
better."

"It hasn't been bad at all, only that there's nothing particular to do.
But I must go. I shall get another place as a governess somewhere, and
that will suit me best."

"Because of the money, you mean."

"Well--that in part."

"I mean to pay you something," said the countess, opening her pocket-book,
and fumbling for two banknotes which she had deposited there.

"Oh, dear, no. I haven't earned anything."

"I always gave Macnulty something, and she was not near so nice as you."
And then the countess produced two ten-pound notes. But Lucy would have
none of her money, and when she was pressed, became proud and almost
indignant in her denial. She had earned nothing, and she would take
nothing; and it was in vain that the old lady spread the clean bits of
paper before her. "And so you'll go and be a governess again; will you?"

"When I can get a place."

"I'll tell you what, my dear. If I were Frank Greystock, I'd stick to my
bargain." Lucy at once fell a-crying, but she smiled upon the old woman
through her tears. "Of course he's going to marry that little limb of the
devil."

"Oh, Lady Linlithgow, if you can, prevent that!"

"How am I to prevent it, my dear? I've nothing to say to either of them."

"It isn't for myself I'm speaking. If I can't--if I can't--can't have
things go as I thought they would by myself, I will never ask any one to
help me. It is not that I mean. I have given all that up."

"You have given it up?"

"Yes; I have. But nevertheless I think of him. She is bad, and he will
never be happy if he marries her. When he asked me to be his wife, he was
mistaken as to what would be good for him. He ought not to have made such
a mistake. For my sake he ought not."

"That's quite true, my dear."

"But I do not wish him to be unhappy all his life. He is not bad, but she
is very bad. I would not for worlds that anybody should tell him that he
owed me anything; but if he could be saved from her, oh, I should be so
glad."

"You won't have my money, then?"

"No, Lady Linlithgow."

"You'd better. It is honestly your own."

"I will not take it, thank you."

"Then I may as well put it up again." And the countess replaced the notes
in her pocket-book. When this conversation took place, Frank Greystock was
travelling back alone from Portray to London. On the same day the Fawn
carriage came to fetch Lucy away. As Lucy was in peculiar distress, Lady
Fawn would not allow her to come by any other conveyance. She did not
exactly think that the carriage would console her poor favourite; but she
did it as she would have ordered something specially nice to eat for any
one who had broken his leg. Her soft heart had compassion for misery,
though she would sometimes show her sympathy by strange expressions. Lady
Linlithgow was almost angry about the carriage. "How many carriages and
how many horses does Lady Fawn keep?" she asked.

"One carriage and two horses."

"She's very fond of sending them up into the streets of London, I think."
Lucy said nothing more, knowing that it would be impossible to soften the
heart of this dowager in regard to the other. But she kissed the old woman
at parting, and then was taken down to Richmond in state.

She had made up her mind to have one discussion with Lady Fawn about her
engagement, the engagement which was no longer an engagement, and then to
have done with it. She would ask Lady Fawn to ask the girls never to
mention Mr. Greystock's name in her hearing. Lady Fawn had also made up
her mind to the same effect. She felt that the subject should be mentioned
once, and once only. Of course Lucy must have another place, but there
need be no hurry about that. She fully recognised her young friend's
feeling of independence, and was herself aware that she would be wrong to
offer to the girl a permanent home among her own daughters, and therefore
she could not abandon the idea of a future place; but Lucy would, of
course, remain till a situation should be found for her that would be in
every sense unexceptionable. There need, however, be no haste, and, in the
mean time, the few words about Frank Greystock must be spoken. They need
not, however, be spoken quite immediately. Let there be smiles, and joy,
and a merry ring of laughter on this the first day of the return of their
old friend. As Lucy had the same feeling on that afternoon they did talk
pleasantly and were merry. The girls asked questions about the vulturess,
as they had heard her called by Lizzie Eustace, and laughed at Lucy, to
her face, when she swore that, after a fashion, she liked the old woman.

"You'd like anybody, then," said Nina.

"Indeed I don't," said Lucy, thinking at once of Lizzie Eustace.

Lady Fawn planned out the next day with great precision. After breakfast,
Lucy and the girls were to spend the morning in the old school-room, so
that there might be a general explanation as to the doings of the last six
months. They were to dine at three, and after dinner there should be the
discussion. "Will you come up to my room at four o'clock, my dear?" said
Lady Fawn, patting Lucy's shoulder, in the breakfast-parlour. Lucy knew
well why her presence was required. Of course she would come. It would be
wise to get it over, and have done with it.

At noon Lady Fawn, with her three eldest daughters, went out in the
carriage, and Lucy was busy among the others with books and maps and
sheets of scribbled music. Nothing was done on that day in the way of
instruction; but there was much of half-jocose acknowledgment of past
idleness, and a profusion of resolutions of future diligence. One or two
of the girls were going to commence a course of reading that would have
broken the back of any professor, and suggestions were made as to very
rigid rules as to the talking of French and German. "But as we can't talk
German," said Nina, "we should simply be dumb."

"You'd talk High-Dutch, Nina, sooner than submit to that," said one of the
sisters.

The conclave was still sitting in full deliberation, when one of the maids
entered the room with a very long face. There was a gentleman in the
drawing-room asking for Miss Morris! Lucy, who at the moment was standing
at a table on which were spread an infinity of books, became at once as
white as a sheet. Her fast friend, Lydia Fawn, who was standing by her,
immediately took hold of her hand quite tightly. The face of the maid was
fit for a funeral. She knew that Miss Morris had had a "follower," that
the follower had come, and that then Miss Morris had gone away. Miss
Morris had been allowed to come back; and now, on the very first day, just
when my lady's back was turned, here was the follower again! Before she
had come up with her message, there had been an unanimous expression of
opinion in the kitchen that the fat would all be in the fire. Lucy was as
white as marble, and felt such a sudden shock at her heart, that she could
not speak. And yet she never doubted for a moment that Frank Greystock was
the man. And with what purpose but one could he have come there? She had
on the old, old frock in which, before her visit to Lady Linlithgow, she
used to pass the morning amid her labours with the girls, a pale, gray,
well-worn frock, to which must have been imparted some attraction from the
milliner's art, because everybody liked it so well, but which she had put
on this very morning as a testimony, to all the world around her, that she
had abandoned the idea of being anything except a governess. Lady Fawn had
understood the frock well. "Here is the dear little old woman just the
same as ever," Lydia had said, embracing her.

"She looks as if she'd gone to bed before the winter, and had a long
sleep, like a dormouse," said Cecilia. Lucy had liked it all, and
thoroughly appreciated the loving-kindness; but she had known what it all
meant. She had left them as the engaged bride of Mr. Greystock, the member
for Bobsborough; and now she had come back as Lucy Morris, the governess,
again.

"Just the same as ever," Lucy had said, with the sweetest smile. They all
understood that in so saying she renounced her lover.

And now there stood the maid, inside the room, who, having announced that
there was a gentleman asking for Miss Morris, was waiting for an answer.
Was the follower to be sent about his business, with a flea in his ear,
having come, slyly, craftily, and wickedly, in Lady Fawn's absence; or
would Miss Morris brazen it out, and go and see him?

"Who is the gentleman?" asked Diana, who was the eldest of the Fawn girls
present.

"It's he as used to come after Miss Morris before," said the maid.

"It is Mr. Greystock," said Lucy, recovering herself with an effort. "I
had better go down to him. Will you tell him, Mary, that I'll be with him
almost immediately?"

"You ought to have put on the other frock, after all," said Nina,
whispering into her ear.

"He has not lost much time in coming to see you," said Lydia.

"I suppose it was all because he didn't like Lady Linlithgow," said
Cecilia. Lucy had not a word to say. She stood for a minute among them,
trying to think, and then she slowly left the room.

She would not condescend to alter her dress by the aid of a single pin,
nor by the adjustment of a ribbon. It might well be that, after the
mingled work and play of the morning, her hair should not be smooth; but
she was too proud to look at her hair. The man whom she had loved, who had
loved her but had neglected her, was in the house. He would surely not
have followed her thither did he not intend to make reparation for his
neglect. But she would use no art with him; nor would she make any
entreaty. It might be that, after all, he had the courage to come and tell
her, in a manly, straightforward way, that the thing must be all over,
that he had made a mistake, and would beg her pardon. If it were so, there
should be no word of reproach. She would be quite quiet with him; but
there should be no word of reproach. But if----in that other case, she
could not be sure of her behaviour; but she knew well that he would not
have to ask long for forgiveness. As for her dress, he had chosen to love
her in that frock before, and she did not think that he would pay much
attention to her dress on the present occasion.

She opened the door very quietly and very slowly, intending to approach
him in the same way; but in a moment, before she could remember that she
was in the room, he had seized her in his arms, and was showering kisses
upon her forehead, her eyes, and her lips. When she thought of it
afterwards, she could not call to mind a single word that he had spoken
before he held her in his embrace. It was she, surely, who had spoken
first, when she begged to be released from his pressure. But she well
remembered the first words that struck her ear. "Dearest Lucy, will you
forgive me?" She could only answer them, through her tears, by taking up
his hand and kissing it.

When Lady Fawn came back with the carriage, she herself saw the figures of
two persons walking very close together, in the shrubberies.

"Is that Lucy?" she asked.

"Yes;" said Augusta, with a tone of horror. "Indeed it is; and--Mr.
Greystock."

Lady Fawn was neither shocked nor displeased; nor was she disappointed;
but a certain faint feeling of being ill-used by circumstances came over
her. "Dear me; the very first day!" she said.

"It's because he wouldn't go to Lady Linlithgow's," said Amelia. "He has
only waited, mamma."

"But the very first day!" exclaimed Lady Fawn. "I hope Lucy will be happy;
that's all."

There was a great meeting of all the Fawns, as soon as Lady Fawn and the
eldest girls were in the house. Mr. Greystock had been walking about the
grounds with Lucy for the last hour and a half. Lucy had come in once to
beg that Lady Fawn might be told directly she came in. "She said you were
to send for her, mamma," said Lydia.

"But it's dinner-time, my dear. What are we to do with Mr. Greystock?"

"Ask him to lunch, of course," said Amelia.

"I suppose it's all right," said Lady Fawn.

"I'm quite sure it's all right," said Nina.

"What did she say to you, Lydia?" asked the mother.

"She was as happy as ever she could be," said Lydia. "There's no doubt
about it's being all right, mamma. She looked just as she did when she got
the letter from him before."

"I hope she managed to change her frock," said Augusta.

"She didn't then," said Cecilia.

"I don't suppose he cares one half-penny about her frock," said Nina. "I
should never think about a man's coat if I was in love."

"Nina, you shouldn't talk in that way," said Augusta. Whereupon Nina made
a face behind one of her sisters' backs. Poor Augusta was never allowed to
be a prophetess among them.

The consultation was ended by a decision in accordance with which Nina
went as an ambassador to the lovers. Lady Fawn sent her compliments to Mr.
Greystock, and hoped he would come in to lunch. Lucy must come in to
dinner, because dinner was ready.

"And mamma wants to see you just for a minute," added Nina, in a pretended
whisper.

"Oh, Nina, you darling girl!" said Lucy, kissing her young friend in an
ecstasy of joy.

"It's all right?" asked Nina in a whisper which was really intended for
privacy. Lucy did not answer the question otherwise than by another kiss.

Frank Greystock was, of course, obliged to take his seat at the table, and
was entertained with a profusion of civility. Everybody knew that he had
behaved badly to Lucy--everybody except Lucy herself, who, from this time
forward, altogether forgot that she had for some time looked upon him as a
traitor, and had made up her mind that she had been deceived and ill-used.
All the Fawns had spoken of him, in Lucy's absence, in the hardest terms
of reproach, and declared that he was not fit to be spoken to by any
decent person. Lady Fawn had known from the first that such a one as he
was not to be trusted. Augusta had never liked him. Amelia had feared that
poor Lucy Morris had been unwise, and too ambitious. Georgina had seen
that, of course, it would never do. Diana had sworn that it was a great
shame. Lydia was sure that Lucy was a great deal too good for him. Cecilia
had wondered where he would go to; a form of anathema which had brought
down a rebuke from her mother. And Nina had always hated him like poison.
But now nothing was too good for him. An unmarried man who is willing to
sacrifice himself is, in feminine eyes, always worthy of ribbons and a
chaplet. Among all these Fawns there was as little selfishness as can be
found, even among women. The lover was not the lover of one of themselves,
but of their governess. And yet, though he desired neither to eat nor
drink at that hour, something special had been cooked for him, and a
special bottle of wine had been brought out of the cellar. All his sins
were forgiven him. No single question was asked as to his gross misconduct
during the last six months. No pledge or guarantee was demanded for the
future. There he was, in the guise of a declared lover, and the fatted
calf was killed.

After this early dinner it was necessary that he should return to town,
and Lucy obtained leave to walk with him to the station. To her thinking
now, there was no sin to be forgiven. Everything was, and had been, just
as it ought to be. Had any human being hinted that he had sinned, she
would have defended him to the death. Something was said between them
about Lizzie, but nothing that arose from jealousy. Not till many months
had passed did she tell him of Lizzie's message to herself, and of her
visit to Hertford Street; but they spoke of the necklace, and poor Lucy
shuddered as she was told the truth about those false oaths.

"I really do think that, after that, Lord Fawn is right," she said,
looking round at her lover.

"Yes; but what he did, he did before that," said Frank.

"But are they not good and kind?" she said, pleading for her friends. "Was
ever anybody so well treated as they have treated me? I'll tell you what,
sir, you mustn't quarrel with Lord Fawn any more. I won't allow it." Then
she walked back from the station alone, almost bewildered by her own
happiness.

That evening something like an explanation was demanded by Lady Fawn, but
no explanation was forthcoming. When questions were asked about his
silence, Lucy, half in joke and half in earnest, fired up and declared
that everything had been as natural as possible. He could not have come to
Lady Linlithgow's house. Lady Linlithgow would not receive him. No doubt
she had been impatient, but then that had been her fault. Had he not come
to her the very first day after her return to Richmond? When Augusta said
something as to letters which might have been written, Lucy snubbed her.
"Who says he didn't write. He did write. If I am contented, why should you
complain?"

"Oh, I don't complain," said Augusta.

Then questions were asked as to the future; questions to which Lady Fawn
had a right to demand an answer. What did Mr. Greystock propose to do now?
Then Lucy broke down, sobbing, crying, triumphing, with mingled love and
happiness. She was to go to the deanery. Frank had brought with him a
little note to her from his mother, in which she was invited to make the
deanery at Bobsborough her home for the present.

"And you are to go away just when you've come?" asked Nina.

"Stay with us a month, my dear," said Lady Fawn, "just to let people know
that we are friends, and after that the deanery will be the best home for
you." And so it was arranged.

        *        *        *        *        *

It need only be further said, in completing the history of Lucy Morris as
far as it can be completed in these pages, that she did go to the deanery,
and that there she was received with all the affection which Mrs.
Greystock could show to an adopted daughter. Her quarrel had never been
with Lucy personally--but with the untoward fact that her son would not
marry money. At the deanery she remained for fifteen happy months, and
then became Mrs. Greystock, with a bevy of Fawn bridesmaids around her. As
the personages of a chronicle such as this should all be made to operate
backwards and forwards on each other from the beginning to the end, it
would have been desirable that the chronicler should have been able to
report that the ceremony was celebrated by Mr. Emilius; but as the wedding
did not take place till the end of the summer, and as Mr. Emilius, at that
time, never remained in town after the season was over, this was
impossible; it was the Dean of Bobsborough, assisted by one of the minor
canons, who performed the service.




CHAPTER LXXVIII

THE TRIAL


Having told the tale of Lucy Morris to the end, the chronicler must now go
back to the more important persons of this history. It was still early in
April when Lizzie Eustace was taken down to Scotland by her cousin, and
the trial of Mr. Benjamin and Mr. Smiler was fixed to take place at the
Central Criminal Court about the middle of May. Early in May the attorneys
for the prosecution applied to Greystock, asking him whether he would make
arrangements for his cousin's appearance on the occasion, informing him
that she had already been formally summoned. Whereupon he wrote to Lizzie,
telling her what she had better do, in the kindest manner--as though there
had been no cessation of their friendly intercourse; offering to go with
her into court--and naming a hotel at which he would advise her to stay,
during the very short time that she need remain in London. She answered
this letter at once. She was sorry to say that she was much too ill to
travel, or even to think of travelling. Such was her present condition
that she doubted greatly whether she would ever again be able to leave the
two rooms to which she was at present confined. All that remained to her
in life was to watch her own blue waves from the casement of her dear
husband's castle--that casement at which he had loved to sit--and to make
herself happy in the smiles of her child. A few months would see the last
of it all, and then, perhaps, they who had trampled her to death would
feel some pang of remorse as they thought of her early fate. She had given
her evidence once and had told all the truth--though she was now aware
that she need not have done so, as she had been defrauded of a vast amount
of property through the gross negligence of the police. She was advised
now by persons who seemed really to understand the law, that she could
recover the value of the diamonds which her dear, dear husband had given
her, from the freeholders of the parish in which the robbery had taken
place. She feared that her health did not admit of the necessary exertion.
Were it otherwise she would leave no stone unturned to recover the value
of her property--not on account of its value, but because she had been so
ill-treated by Mr. Camperdown and the police. Then she added a postscript
to say that it was quite out of the question that she should take any
journey for the next six months.

The reader need hardly be told that Greystock did not believe a word of
what she said. He felt sure that she was not ill. There was an energy in
the letter hardly compatible with illness. But he could not make her come.
He certainly did not intend to go down again to Scotland to fetch her; and
even had he done so he could not have forced her to accompany him. He
could only go to the attorneys concerned, and read to them so much of the
letter as he thought fit to communicate to them.

"That won't do at all," said an old gentleman at the head of the firm.
"She has been very leniently treated, and she must come."

"You must manage it, then," said Frank.

"I hope she won't give us trouble, because if she does we must expose
her," said the second member.

"She has not even sent a medical certificate," said the tyro of the firm,
who was not quite so sharp as he will probably become when he has been a
member of it for ten or twelve years. You should never ask the ostler
whether he greases his oats. In this case Frank Greystock was not exactly
in the position of the ostler; but he did inform his cousin by letter that
she would lay herself open to all manner of pains and penalties if she
disobeyed such a summons as she had received, unless she did so by a very
strong medical advice, backed by a medical certificate.

Lizzie, when she received this, had two strings to her bow. A writer from
Ayr had told her that the summons sent to her was not worth the paper on
which it was printed in regard to a resident in Scotland; and she had also
got a doctor from the neighbourhood who was satisfied that she was far too
ill to travel up to London. Pulmonary debilitation was the complaint from
which she was suffering, which, with depressed vitality in all the organs,
and undue languor in all the bodily functions, would be enough to bring
her to a speedy end if she so much as thought of making a journey up to
London. A certificate to this effect was got in triplicate. One copy she
sent to the attorneys, one to Frank, and one she kept herself.

The matter was very pressing indeed. It was considered that the trial
could not be postponed till the next sitting at the Criminal Court,
because certain witnesses in respect to the diamonds had been procured
from Hamburg and Vienna, at a very great cost; they were actually on their
way to London when Lizzie's second letter was received. Mr. Camperdown had
resolved to have the diamonds still, with a hope that they might be
restored to the keeping of Messrs. Garnett, there to lie hidden and
unused, at any rate for the next twenty years. The diamonds had been
traced first to Hamburg and then to Vienna, and it was to be proved that
they were now adorning the bosom of a certain enormously rich Russian
princess. From the grasp of the Russian princess it was found impossible
to rescue them; but the witnesses who, as it was hoped, might have aided
Mr. Camperdown in his efforts, were to be examined at the trial.

A confidential clerk was sent down to Portray, but the confidential clerk
altogether failed in making his way into Lizzie's presence. Word was
brought to him that nothing but force could take Lady Eustace from her
bedchamber; and that force used to that effect might take her out dead,
but certainly not alive. He made inquiry, however, about the doctor, and
found that he certainly was a doctor. If a doctor will certify that a lady
is dying, what can any judge do, or any jury? There are certain statements
which, though they are false as hell, must be treated as though they were
true as gospel. The clerk reported when he got back to London, that to his
belief Lady Eustace was enjoying an excellent state of health; but that he
was perfectly certain that she would not appear as a witness at the trial.

The anger felt by many persons as to Lizzie's fraudulent obstinacy was
intense. Mr. Camperdown thought that she ought to be dragged up to London
by cart ropes. The attorneys engaged for the prosecution were almost
beside themselves. They did send down a doctor of their own, but Lizzie
would not see the doctor--would not see the doctor though threats of most
frightful consequences were conveyed to her. She would be exposed, fined
thousands of pounds, committed to jail for contempt of court, and
prosecuted for perjury into the bargain. But she was firm. She wrote one
scrap of a note to the doctor who came from London. "I shall not live to
satisfy their rabid vengeance." Even Frank Greystock felt almost more
annoyed than gratified that she should be able thus to escape. People who
had heard of the inquiry before the magistrate, had postponed their
excitement and interest on the occasion because they knew that the day of
the trial would be the great day; and when they heard that they were to be
robbed of the pleasure of Lady Eustace's cross-examination, there arose
almost a public feeling of wrath that justice should be thus outraged. The
doctor who had given the certificate was vilified in the newspapers, and
long articles were written as to the impotence of the law. But Lizzie was
successful, and the trial went on without her.

It appeared that though her evidence was very desirable it was not
absolutely essential, as, in consequence of her certified illness, the
statement which she had made at the police-court could be brought up and
used against the prisoners. All the facts of the robbery were, moreover,
proved by Patience Crabstick and Billy Cann; and the transfer of the
diamonds by Mr. Benjamin to the man who recut them at Hamburg was also
proved. Many other morsels of collateral evidence had also been picked up
by the police, so that there was no possible doubt as to any detail of the
affair in Hertford Street. There was a rumour that Mr. Benjamin intended
to plead guilty. He might, perhaps, have done so had it not been for the
absence of Lady Eustace; but as that was thought to give him a possible
chance of escape, he stood his ground.

Lizzie's absence was a great disappointment to the sightseers of London;
but nevertheless the court was crowded. It was understood that the learned
sergeant who was retained on this occasion to defend Mr. Benjamin, and who
was assisted by the acute gentleman who had appeared before the
magistrate, would be rather severe upon Lady Eustace, even in her absence;
and that he would ground his demand for an acquittal on the combined facts
of her retention of the diamonds, her perjury, and of her obstinate
refusal to come forward on the present occasion. As it was known that he
could be very severe, many came to hear him, and they were not
disappointed. The reader shall see a portion of his address to the jury,
which we hope may have had some salutary effect on Lizzie as she read it
in her retreat at Portray looking out upon her own blue waves.

"And now, gentlemen of the jury, let me recapitulate to you the history of
this lady as far as it relates to the diamonds, as to which my client is
now in jeopardy. You have heard on the testimony of Mr. Camperdown that
they were not hers at all, that, at any rate, they were not supposed to be
hers by those in whose hands was left the administration of her husband's
estate, and that when they were first supposed to have been stolen at the
inn at Carlisle, he had already commenced legal steps for the recovery of
them from her clutches. A bill in Chancery had been filed because she had
obstinately refused to allow them to pass out of her hands. It has been
proved to you by Lord Fawn that though he was engaged to marry her he
broke his engagement because he supposed her possession of these diamonds
to be fraudulent and dishonest." This examination had been terrible to the
unfortunate undersecretary; and had absolutely driven him away from the
India board and from Parliament for a month. "It has been proved to you
that when the diamonds were supposed to have vanished at Carlisle, she
there committed perjury. That she did so she herself stated on oath in
that evidence which she gave before the magistrate when my client was
committed, and which has, as I maintain, improperly and illegally been
used against my client at this trial." Here the judge looked over his
spectacles and admonished the learned sergeant that his argument on that
subject had already been heard, and the matter decided. "True, my lord;
but my conviction of my duty to my client compels me to revert to it. Lady
Eustace committed perjury at Carlisle, having the diamonds in her pocket
at the very moment in which she swore that they had been stolen from her;
and if justice had really been done in this case, gentlemen, it is Lady
Eustace who should now be on her trial before you, and not my unfortunate
client. Well, what is the next that we hear of it? It seems that she
brought the diamonds up to London; but how long she kept them there nobody
knows. It was, however, necessary to account for them. A robbery is got up
between a young woman who seems to have been the confidential friend,
rather than the maid, of Lady Eustace, and that other witness whom you
have heard testifying against himself, and who is, of all the informers
that ever came into my hands, the most flippant, the most hardened, the
least conscientious, and the least credible. That those two were engaged
in a conspiracy I cannot doubt. That Lady Eustace was engaged with them I
will not say; but I will ask you to consider whether such may not probably
have been the case. At any rate she then perjures herself again. She gives
a list of the articles stolen from her, and omits the diamonds. She either
perjures herself a second time, or else the diamonds, in regard to which
my client is in jeopardy, were not in the house at all, and could not then
have been stolen. It may very probably have been so. Nothing more
probable. Mr. Camperdown and the managers of the Eustace estate had
gradually come to a belief that the Carlisle robbery was a hoax, and
therefore another robbery is necessary to account for the diamonds.
Another robbery is arranged, and this young and beautiful widow, as bold
as brass, again goes before the magistrate and swears. Either the diamonds
were not stolen or else she commits a second perjury.

"And now, gentlemen, she is not here. She is sick forsooth at her own
castle in Scotland, and sends to us a medical certificate; but the
gentlemen who are carrying on this prosecution know their witness, and
don't believe a word of her sickness. Had she the feelings of woman in her
bosom she ought indeed to be sick unto death. But they know her better and
send down a doctor of their own. You have heard his evidence, and yet this
wonderful lady is not before us. I say again that she ought to be here in
that dock--in that dock in spite of her fortune, in that dock in spite of
her title, in that dock in spite of her castle, her riches, her beauty,
and her great relatives. A most wonderful woman, indeed, is the widow
Eustace. It is she whom public opinion will convict as the guilty one in
this marvellous mass of conspiracy and intrigue. In her absence, and after
what she has done herself, can you convict any man either of stealing or
of disposing of these diamonds?" The vigour, the attitude, and the
indignant tone of the man were more even than his words; but,
nevertheless, the jury found both Benjamin and Smiler guilty, and the
judge sentenced them to penal servitude for fifteen years.

And this was the end of the Eustace diamonds, as far as anything was ever
known of them in England. Mr. Camperdown altogether failed, even in his
attempt to buy them back at something less than their value, and was
ashamed himself to look at the figures, when he found how much money he
had wasted for his clients in their pursuit. In discussing the matter
afterwards with Mr. Dove, he excused himself by asserting his inability to
see so gross a robbery perpetrated by a little minx, under his very eyes,
without interfering with the plunder.

"I knew what she was," he said, "from the moment of Sir Florian's
unfortunate marriage. He had brought a little harpy into the family, and I
was obliged to declare war against her." Mr. Dove seemed to be of opinion
that the ultimate loss of the diamonds was, upon the whole, desirable as
regarded the whole community.

"I should like to have had the case settled as to right of possession," he
said, "because there were in it one or two points of interest. We none of
us know, for instance, what a man can, or what a man cannot, give away by
a mere word."

"No such word was ever spoken," said Mr. Camperdown in wrath.

"Such evidence as there is would have gone to show that it had been
spoken. But the very existence of such property so to be disposed of, or
so not to be disposed of, is in itself an evil. Then, we have had to fight
for six months about a lot of stones hardly so useful as the flags in the
street, and then they vanish from us, leaving us nothing to repay us for
our labour." All of which Mr. Camperdown did not quite understand. Mr.
Dove would be paid for his labour, as to which, however, Mr. Camperdown
knew well that no human being was more indifferent than Mr. Dove.

There was much sorrow, too, among the police. They had no doubt succeeded
in sending two scoundrels out of the social world, probably for life, and
had succeeded in avoiding the reproach which a great robbery unaccounted
for always entails upon them; but it was sad to them that the property
should altogether have been lost; and sad also that they should have been
constrained to allow Billy Cann to escape out of their hands. Perhaps the
sadness may have been lessened to a certain degree in the breast of the
great Mr. Gager by the charms and graces of Patience Crabstick, to whom he
kept his word by making her his wife. This fact, or rather the prospect of
this fact, as it then was, had also come to the knowledge of the learned
sergeant, and in his hands had served to add another interest to the
trial. Mr. Gager, when examined on the subject, did not attempt to deny
the impeachment, and expressed a strong opinion that, though Miss
Crabstick had given way to temptation under the wiles of the Jew, she
would make an honest and an excellent wife. In which expectation let us
trust that he may not be deceived.

Amusement had, indeed, been expected from other sources which failed. Mrs.
Carbuncle had been summoned, and Lord George; but both of them had left
town before the summons could reach them. It was rumoured that Mrs.
Carbuncle, with her niece, had gone to join her husband at New York. At
any rate, she disappeared altogether from London, leaving behind her an
amount of debts which showed how extremely liberal in their dealings the
great tradesmen of London will occasionally be. There were milliners'
bills which had been running for three years, and horse-dealers had given
her credit year after year, though they had scarcely ever seen the colour
of her money. One account, however, she had honestly settled. The hotel-
keeper in Albemarle Street had been paid, and all the tribute had been
packed and carried off from the scene of the proposed wedding banquet.
What became of Lord George for the next six months nobody ever knew; but
he appeared at Melton in the following November, and I do not know that
any one dared to ask him questions about the Eustace diamonds.

Of Lizzie, and her future career, something further must be said in the
concluding chapters of this work. She has been our heroine, and we must
see her through her immediate troubles before we can leave her; but it may
be as well to mention here that, although many threats had been uttered
against her, not only by Mr. Camperdown and the other attorneys, but even
by the judge himself, no punishment at all was inflicted upon her in
regard to her recusancy, nor was any attempt made to punish her. The
affair was over, and men were glad to avoid the necessity of troubling
themselves further with the business. It was said that a case would be got
up with the view of proving that she had not been ill at all, and that the
Scotch doctor would be subjected to the loss of his degree, or whatever
privileges in the healing art belonged to him; but nothing was done, and
Lizzie triumphed in her success.




CHAPTER LXXIX

ONCE MORE AT PORTRAY


On the very day of the trial Mr. Emilius travelled from London to
Kilmarnock. The trial took place on a Monday, so that he had at his
command an entire week before he would be required to appear again in his
church. He had watched the case against Benjamin and Smiler very closely,
and had known beforehand, almost with accuracy, what witnesses would
appear and what would not at the great coming event at the Old Bailey.
When he first heard of Lady Eustace's illness he wrote to her a most
affectionately pastoral letter, strongly adjuring her to think of her
health before all things, and assuring her that in his opinion and in that
of all his friends she was quite right not to come up to London. She wrote
him a very short but very gracious answer, thanking him for his solicitude
and explaining to him that her condition made it quite impossible that she
should leave Portray. "I don't suppose anybody knows how ill I am; but it
does not matter. When I am gone, they will know what they have done." Then
Mr. Emilius resolved that he would go down to Scotland. Perhaps Lady
Eustace was not as ill as she thought; but it might be that the trial and
the hard things lately said of her, and her loneliness and the feeling
that she needed protection, might, at such a moment as this, soften her
heart. She should know at least that one tender friend did not desert her
because of the evil things which men said of her.

He went to Kilmarnock, thinking it better to make his approaches by
degrees. Were he to present himself at once at the castle and be refused
admittance, he would hardly know how to repeat his application or to force
himself upon her presence. From Kilmarnock he wrote to her, saying that
business connected with his ministrations during the coming autumn had
brought him into her beautiful neighbourhood, and that he could not leave
it without paying his respects to her in person. With her permission he
would call upon her on the Thursday at about noon. He trusted that the
state of her health would not prevent her from seeing him, and reminded
her that a clergyman was often as welcome a visitor at the bedside of the
invalid, as the doctor or the nurse. He gave her no address, as he rather
wished to hinder her from answering him, but at the appointed hour he
knocked at the castle door.

Need it be said that Lizzie's state of health was not such as to preclude
her from seeing so intimate a friend as Mr. Emilius. That she was right to
avoid by any effort the castigation which was to have fallen upon her from
the tongue of the learned sergeant, the reader who is not straight-laced
will be disposed to admit. A lone woman, very young, and delicately
organised! How could she have stood up against such treatment as was in
store for her? And is it not the case that false pretexts against public
demands are always held to be justifiable by the female mind? What lady
will ever scruple to avoid her taxes? What woman ever understood her duty
to the State? And this duty which was required of her was so terrible that
it might well have reduced to falsehood a stouter heart than her own. It
can hardly be reckoned among Lizzie's great sins that she did not make
that journey up to London; An appearance of sickness she did maintain,
even with her own domestics. To do as much as that was due even to the
doctor whom she had cajoled out of the certificate, and who was afterwards
frightened into maintaining it. But Mr. Emilius was her clergyman--her own
clergyman, as she took care to say to her maid--her own clergyman, who had
come all the way from London to be present with her in her sickness; and
of course she would see him.

Lizzie did not think much of the coming autumnal ministration at
Kilmarnock. She knew very well why Mr. Emilius had undertaken the expense
of a journey into Scotland in the middle of the London season. She had
been maimed fearfully in her late contests with the world, and was now
lame and soiled and impotent. The boy with none of the equipments of the
skilled sportsman can make himself master of a wounded bird. Mr. Emilius
was seeking her in the moment of her weakness, fearing that all chance of
success might be over for him should she ever again recover the full use
of her wings. All this Lizzie understood, and was able to measure Mr.
Emilius at his own value of himself; but then, again, she was forced to
ask herself what was her value. She had been terribly mauled by the
fowlers. She had been hit, so to say, on both wings, and hardly knew
whether she would ever again be able to attempt a flight in public. She
could not live alone in Portray Castle for the rest of her days. Ianthe's
soul and the Corsair were not, in truth, able to console her for the loss
of society. She must have somebody to depend upon--ah, some one whom, if
it were possible, she might love. She saw no reason why she should not
love Mr. Emilius. She had been shockingly ill-treated by Lord Fawn and the
Corsair and Frank Greystock. No woman had ever been so knocked about in
her affections. She pitied herself with an exceeding pity when she thought
of all the hardships which she had endured. Left an early widow,
persecuted by her husband's family, twice robbed, spied upon by her own
servants, unappreciated by the world at large, ill-used by three lovers,
victimised by her selected friend, Mrs. Carbuncle, and now driven out of
society because she had lost her diamonds, was she not more cruelly
treated than any woman of whom she had ever read or heard? But she was not
going to give up the battle, even now. She still had her income, and she
had great faith in income. And though she knew that she had been
grievously wounded by the fowlers, she believed that time would heal her
wounds. The world would not continue to turn its back altogether upon a
woman with four thousand pounds a year, because she had told a fib about
her necklace. She weighed all this; but the conviction strongest upon her
mind was the necessity that she should have a husband. She felt that a
woman by herself in the world can do nothing, and that an unmarried
woman's strength lies only in the expectation that she may soon be
married. To her it was essentially necessary that she should have the
protection of a husband who might endure on her behalf some portion of
those buffetings to which she seemed to be especially doomed. Could she do
better with herself than to take Mr. Emilius?

Might she have chosen from all the world, Mr. Emilius was not, perhaps,
the man whom she would have selected. There were, indeed, attributes in
the man, very objectionable in the sight of some people, which to her were
not specially disagreeable. She thought him rather good-looking than
otherwise, in spite of a slight defect in his left eye. His coal-black,
glossy hair commanded and obtained her admiration, and she found his hooky
nose to be handsome. She did not think much of the ancestral blood of
which he had boasted, and hardly believed that he would ever become a
bishop. But he was popular, and with a rich, titled wife, might become
more so. Mr. Emilius and Lady Eustace would, she thought, sound very well,
and would surely make their way in society. The man had a grasping
ambition about him, and a capacity, too, which, combined, would enable him
to preach himself into notoriety. And then in marrying Mr. Emilius, should
she determine to do so, she might be sure, almost sure, of dictating her
own terms as to settlement. With Lord Fawn, with Lord George, or even with
her cousin Frank, there would have been much difficulty. She thought that
with Mr. Emilius she might obtain the undisputed command of her own
income. But she did not quite make up her mind. She would see him and hear
what he had to say. Her income was her own, and should she refuse Mr.
Emilius, other suitors would no doubt come.

She dressed herself with considerable care--having first thought of
receiving him in bed; but as the trial had now gone on without her, it
would be convenient that her recovery should be commenced. So she had
herself dressed in a white morning wrapper with pink bows, and allowed the
curl to be made fit to hang over her shoulder. And she put on a pair of
pretty slippers, with gilt bindings, and took a laced handkerchief and a
volume of Shelley--and so prepared herself to receive Mr. Emilius. Lizzie,
since the reader first knew her, had begun to use a little colouring in
the arrangement of her face, and now, in honour of her sickness, she was
very pale indeed; but still, through the paleness, there was the faintest
possible tinge of pink colour shining through the translucent pearl
powder. Any one who knew Lizzie would be sure that when she did paint she
would paint well.

The conversation at first was, of course, confined to the lady's health.
She thought that she was, perhaps, getting better, though, as the doctor
had told her, the reassuring symptoms might probably prove only too
fallacious. She could eat nothing--literally nothing. A few grapes out of
the hot-house had supported her for the last week. This statement was
foolish on Lizzie's part, as Mr. Emilius was a man of an inquiring nature,
and there was not a grape in the garden. Her only delight was in reading
and in her child's society. Sometimes she thought that she would pass away
with the boy in her arms and her favourite volume of Shelley in her hand.
Mr. Emilius expressed a hope that she would not pass away yet, for ever so
many years.

"Oh, my friend," said Lizzie, "what is life, that one should desire it?"
Mr. Emilius of course reminded her that, though her life might be nothing
to herself, it was very much indeed to those who loved her. "Yes--to my
boy," said Lizzie. Mr. Emilius informed her, with confidence, that it was
not only her boy that loved her. There were others--or, at any rate, one
other. She might be sure of one faithful heart, if she cared for that.
Lizzie only smiled and threw from her taper fingers a little paper pellet
into the middle of the room--probably with the view of showing at what
value she prized the heart of which Mr. Emilius was speaking.

The trial had occupied two days, Monday and Tuesday, and this was now the
Wednesday. The result had been telegraphed to Mr. Emilius, of course
without any record of the sergeant's bitter speech, and the suitor now
gave the news to his ladylove. Those two horrid men had at last been found
guilty, and punished with all the severity of the law. "Poor fellows,"
said Lady Eustace, "poor Mr. Benjamin! Those ill-starred jewels have been
almost as unkind to him as to me."

"He'll never come back alive, of course," said Mr. Emilius. "It'll kill
him."

"And it will kill me too," said Lizzie. "I have a something here which
tells me that I shall never recover. Nobody will ever believe what I have
suffered about those paltry diamonds. But he coveted them. I never coveted
them, Mr. Emilius; though I clung to them because they were my darling
husband's last gift to me." Mr. Emilius assured her that he quite
understood the facts, and appreciated all her feelings.

And now, as he thought, had come the time for pressing his suit. With
widows, he had been told, the wooing should be brisk. He had already once
asked her to be his wife, and of course she knew the motive of his journey
down to Scotland. "Dearest Lady Eustace," he said suddenly, "may I be
allowed to renew the petition which I was once bold enough to make to you
in London?"

"Petition?" exclaimed Lizzie.

"Ah, yes: I can well understand that your indifference should enable you
to forget it. Lady Eustace, I did venture to tell you--that--I loved you."

"Mr. Emilius, so many men have told me that."

"I can well believe it. Some have told you so, perhaps, from base,
mercenary motives."

"You are very complimentary, sir."

"I shall never pay you any compliments, Lady Eustace. Whatever may be our
future intercourse in life, you will only hear words of truth from my
lips. Some have told you so from mercenary motives." Mr. Emilius repeated
the words with severity, and then paused to hear whether she would dare to
argue with him. As she was silent, he changed his voice, and went on with
that sweet, oily tone which had made his fortune for him. "Some, no doubt,
have spoken from the inner depths of their hearts; but none, Lady Eustace,
have spoken with such adamantine truth, with so intense an anxiety, with
so personal a solicitude for your welfare in this world and the next, as
that, or I should rather say those, which glow within this bosom." Lizzie
was certainly pleased by the manner in which he addressed her. She thought
that a man ought to dare to speak out, and that on such an occasion as
this he should venture to do so with some enthusiasm and some poetry. She
considered that men generally were afraid of expressing themselves, and
were as dumb as dogs from the want of becoming spirit. Mr. Emilius
gesticulated, and struck his breast, and brought out his words as though
he meant them.

"It is easy to say all that, Mr. Emilius," she replied.

"The saying of it is hard enough, Lady Eustace. You can never know how
hard, it is to speak from a, full heart. But to feel it, I will not say is
easy; only to me; not to feel it is impossible. Lady Eustace, my heart is
devoted to your heart, and seeks its comrade. It is sick with love, and
will not be stayed. It forces from me words, words which will return upon
me with all the bitterness of gall, if they be not accepted by you as
faithful, ay and of great value."

"I know well the value of such a heart as yours, Mr. Emilius."

"Accept it then, dearest one."

"Love will not always go by command, Mr. Emilius."

"No, indeed; nor at command will it stay away. Do you think I have not
tried that? Do you believe that for a man it can be pleasant to be
rebuffed; that for one who up to this day has always walked on, triumphant
over every obstacle, who has conquered every nay that has obstructed his
path, it can have less of bitterness than the bitterness of death to
encounter a no from the lips of a woman?"

"A poor woman's no should be nothing to you, Mr. Emilius."

"It is everything to me, death, destruction, annihilation, unless I can
overcome it. Darling of my heart, queen of my soul, empress presiding over
the very spirit of my being, say, shall I overcome it now?"

She had never been made love to after this fashion before. She knew, or
half knew, that the man was a scheming hypocrite, craving her money, and
following her in the hour of her troubles, because he might then have the
best chance of success. She had no belief whatever in his love; and yet
she liked it, and approved his proceedings. She liked lies, thinking them
to be more beautiful than truth. To lie readily and cleverly, recklessly
and yet successfully, was, according to the lessons which she had learned,
a necessity in woman and an added grace in man. There was that wretched
Macnulty, who would never lie; and what was the result? She was unfit even
for the poor condition of life which she pretended to fill. When poor
Macnulty had heard that Mr. Emilius was coming to the castle, and had not
even mentioned her name, and again, when he had been announced on this
very morning, the unfortunate woman had been unable to control her absurd
disappointment.

"Mr. Emilius," Lizzie said, throwing herself back upon her couch, "you
press me very hard."

"I would press you harder still to gain the glory I covet." And he made a
motion with arms as though he had already got her tight within his grasp.

"You take advantage of my illness."

"In attacking a fortress do not the besiegers take all advantages? Dear
Lady Eustace, allow me to return to London with the right of protecting
your name at this moment, in which the false and the thoughtless are
attacking it. You need a defender now."

"I can defend myself, sir, from all attacks. I do not know that any one
can hurt me."

"God forbid that you should be hurt. Heaven forbid that even the winds of
Heaven should blow too harshly on my beloved. But my beloved is subject to
the malice of the world. My beloved is a flower all beautiful within and
without, but one whose stalk is weak, whose petals are too delicate, whose
soft bloom is evanescent. Let me be the strong staff against which my
beloved may blow in safety."

A vague idea came across Lizzie's mind that this glowing language had a
taste of the Bible about it, and that, therefore, it was in some degree
impersonal and intended to be pious. She did not relish piety at such a
crisis as this, and was therefore for a moment inclined to be cold; but
she liked being called a flower, and was not quite sure whether she
remembered her Bible rightly. The words which struck her ear as familiar
might have come from Juan and Haidee, and if so, nothing could be more
opportune.

"Do you expect me to give you an answer now, Mr. Emilius?"

"Yes, now." And he stood before her in calm dignity, with his arms crossed
upon his breast.

She did give him his answer then and there, but first she turned her face
to the wall, or rather to the back of the sofa, and burst into a flood of
tears. It was a delicious moment to her, that in which she was weeping.
She sobbed forth something about her child, something about her sorrows,
something as to the wretchedness of her lot in life, something of her
widowed heart, something also of that duty to others which would compel
her to keep her income in her own hands; and then she yielded herself to
his entreaties.

       *       *       *       *       *

That evening she thought it proper to tell Miss Macnulty what had
occurred. "He is a great preacher of the gospel," she said, "and I know no
position in the world more worthy of a woman's fondest admiration." Miss
Macnulty was unable to answer a word. She could not congratulate her
successful rival, even though her bread depended on it. She crept slowly
out of the room, and went up-stairs and wept.

Early in the month of June, Lady Eustace was led to the hymeneal altar by
her clerical bridegroom. The wedding took place at the Episcopal Church at
Ayr, far from the eyes of curious Londoners. It need only be further said
that Mr. Emilius could be persuaded to agree to no settlements prejudicial
to that marital supremacy which should be attached to the husband; and
that Lizzie, when the moment came, knowing that her betrothal had been
made public to all the world, did not dare to recede from another
engagement. It may be that Mr. Emilius will suit her as well as any
husband that she could find, unless it shall be found that his previous
career has been too adventurous. After a certain fashion he will, perhaps,
be tender to her; but he will have his own way in everything, and be no
whit afraid when she is about to die in an agony of tears before his eyes.
The writer of the present story may, however, declare that the future fate
of this lady shall not be left altogether in obscurity.




CHAPTER LXXX

WHAT WAS SAID ABOUT IT ALL AT MATCHING


The Whitsuntide holidays were late this year, not taking place till the
beginning of June, and were protracted till the 9th of that month. On the
8th Lizzie and Mr. Emilius became man and wife, and on that same day Lady
Glencora Palliser entertained a large company of guests at Matching
Priory. That the Duke of Omnium was there was quite a matter of course.
Indeed in these days Lady Glencora seldom separated herself far, or for
any long time, from her husband's uncle, doing her duty to the head of her
husband's family in the most exemplary manner. People, indeed, said that
she watched him narrowly, but of persons in high station common people
will say anything. It was at any rate certain that she made the declining
years of that great nobleman's life comfortable and decorous. Madame Max
Goesler was also at Matching, a lady whose society always gave
gratification to the duke. And Mr. Palliser was also there, taking the
rest that was so needful to him; by which it must be understood that after
having worked all day he was able to eat his dinner and then only write a
few letters before going to bed, instead of attending the House of Commons
till two or three o'clock in the morning; but his mind was still deep in
quints and semi-tenths. His great measure was even now in committee. His
hundred and second clause had been carried, with only nine divisions
against him of any consequence. Seven of the most material clauses had no
doubt been postponed, and the great bone of contention as to the two
superfluous farthings still remained before him; nevertheless he fondly
hoped that he would be able to send his bill complete to the House of
Lords before the end of July. What might be done in the way of amendments
there he had hitherto refused to consider. "If the peers choose to put
themselves in opposition to the whole nation, on a purely commercial
question, the responsibility of all evils that may follow must be at their
doors." This he had said as a commoner. A year or two at the furthest--or
more probably a few months--would make him a peer; and then no doubt he
would look at the matter in a wholly different light. But he worked at his
great measure with a diligence which at any rate deserved success; and he
now had with him a whole bevy of secretaries, private secretaries, chief
clerks, and accountants, all of whom Lady Glencora captivated by her
flattering ways and laughed at behind their backs. Mr. Bonteen was there
with his wife, repeatedly declaring to all his friends that England would
achieve the glories of decimal coinage by his blood and over his grave,
and Barrington Erle, who took things much more easily, and Lord Chiltern,
with his wife, who would occasionally ask her if she could explain to him
the value of a quint, and many others whom it may not be necessary to
name. Lord Fawn was not there. Lord Fawn, whose health had temporarily
given way beneath the pressing labours of the India board, was visiting
his estates in Tipperary.

"She is married to-day, duke, down in Scotland," said Lady Glencora,
sitting close to the duke's ear, for the duke was a little deaf. They were
in the duke's small morning sitting-room, and no one else was present
excepting Madame Max Goesler.

"Married to-morrow down in Scotland. Dear, dear! what is he?" The
profession to which Mr. Emilius belonged had been mentioned to the duke
more than once before.

"He's some sort of a clergyman, duke. You went and heard him preach,
Madame Max. You can tell us what he's like."

"Oh, yes; he's a clergyman of our Church," said Madame Goesler.

"A clergyman of our Church; dear, dear! And married in Scotland! That
makes it stranger. I wonder what made a clergyman marry her?"

"Money, duke," said Lady Glencora, speaking very loud.

"Oh, ah, yes; money. So he'd got money; had he?"

"Not a penny, duke; but she had."

"Oh, ah, yes. I forgot. She was very well left; wasn't she? And so she has
married a clergyman without a penny. Dear, dear! Did not you say she was
very beautiful?"

"Lovely!"

"Let me see, you went and saw her, didn't you?"

"I went to her twice, and got quite scolded about it. Plantagenet said
that if I wanted horrors I'd better go to Madame Tussaud. Didn't he,
Madame Max?" Madame Max smiled and nodded her head.

"And what's the clergyman like?" asked the duke.

"Now, my dear, you must take up the running," said Lady Glencora, dropping
her voice. "I ran after the lady but it was you who ran after the
gentleman." Then she raised her voice. "Madame Max will tell you all about
it, duke. She knows him very well."

"You know him very well; do you? Dear, dear dear!"

"I don't know him at all, duke, but I once went to hear him preach. He's
one of those men who string words together, and do a good deal of work
with a cambric pocket-handkerchief."

"A gentleman?" asked the duke.

"About as like a gentleman as you're like an archbishop," said Lady
Glencora.

This tickled the duke amazingly. "He, he, he; I don't see why I shouldn't
be like an archbishop. If I hadn't happened to be a duke I should have
liked to be an archbishop. Both the archbishops take rank of me. I never
quite understood why that was, but they do. And these things never can be
altered when they're once settled. It's quite absurd nowadays since
they've cut the archbishops down so terribly. They were princes once, I
suppose, and had great power. But it's quite absurd now, and so they must
feel it. I have often thought about that a good deal, Glencora."

"And I think about poor Mrs. Arch, who hasn't got any rank at all."

"A great prelate having a wife does seem to be an absurdity," said Madame
Max, who had passed some years of her life in a Catholic country.

"And the man is a cad; is he?" asked the duke.

"A Bohemian Jew, duke, an impostor who has come over here to make a
fortune. We hear that he has a wife in Prague, and probably two or three
elsewhere. But he has got poor little Lizzie Eustace and all her money
into his grasp, and they who know him say that he's likely to keep it."

"Dear, dear, dear!"

"Barrington says that the best spec he knows out, for a younger son, would
be to go to Prague for the former wife and bring her back, with evidence
of the marriage. The poor little woman could not fail of being grateful to
the hero who would liberate her."

"Dear, dear, dear!" said the duke. "And the diamonds never turned up after
all. I think that was a pity, because I knew the late man's father very
well. We used to be together a good deal at one time. He had a fine
property, and we used to live--but I can't just tell you how we used to
live. He, he, he!"

"You had better tell us nothing about it, duke," said Madame Max.

The affairs of our heroine were again discussed that evening, in another
part of the Priory. They were in the billiard-room in the evening, and Mr.
Bonteen was inveighing against the inadequacy of the law as it had been
brought to bear against the sinners who between them had succeeded in
making away with the Eustace diamonds. "It was a most unworthy conclusion
to such a plot," he said. "It always happens that they catch the small fry
and let the large fish escape."

"Whom did you specially want to catch?" asked Lady Glencora.

"Lady Eustace and Lord George de Bruce Carruthers, as he calls himself."

"I quite agree with you, Mr. Bonteen, that it would be very nice to send
the brother of a marquis to Botany Bay or wherever they go now; and that
it would do a deal of good to have the widow of a baronet locked up in the
Penitentiary; but you see if they didn't happen to be guilty it would be
almost a shame to punish them for the sake of the example."

"They ought to have been guilty," said Barrington Erle.

"They were guilty," protested Mr. Bonteen.

Mr. Palliser was enjoying ten minutes of recreation before he went back to
his letters. "I can't say that I attended to the case very closely," he
observed, "and perhaps, therefore, I am not, entitled to speak about it."

"If people only spoke about what they attended to, how very little there
would be to say, eh, Mr. Bonteen?" This observation came, of course, from
Lady Glencora.

"But as far as I could hear," continued Mr. Palliser, "Lord George
Carruthers cannot possibly have had anything to do with it. It was a
stupid mistake on the part of the police."

"I'm not quite so sure, Mr. Palliser," said Bonteen.

"I know Coldfoot told me so." Now, Sir Harry Coldfoot was at this time
Secretary of State for the home affairs, and in a matter of such
importance, of course, had an opinion of his own.

"We all know that he had money dealings with Benjamin, the Jew," said Mrs.
Bonteen.

"Why didn't he come forward as a witness when he was summoned?" asked Mrs.
Bonteen triumphantly. "And as for the woman, does anybody mean to say that
she should not have been indicted for perjury?"

"The woman, as you are pleased to call her, is my particular friend," said
Lady Glencora. When Lady Glencora made any such statement as this--and she
often did make such statements--no one dared to answer her. It was
understood that Lady Glencora was not to be snubbed, though she was very
much given to snubbing others. She had attained this position for herself
by a mixture of beauty, rank, wealth, and courage, but the courage had, of
the four, been her greatest mainstay.

Then Lord Chiltern, who was playing billiards with Barrington Erle, rapped
his cue down on the floor, and made a speech.

"I never was so sick of anything in my life as I am of Lady Eustace.
People have talked about her now for the last six months."

"Only three months, Lord Chiltern," said Lady Glencora in a tone of
rebuke.

"And all that I can hear of her is that she has told a lot of lies and
lost a necklace."

"When Lady Chiltern loses a necklace worth ten thousand pounds, there will
be talk of her," said Lady Glencora.

At that moment Madame Max Goesler entered the room and whispered a word to
the hostess. She had just come from the duke, who could not bear the
racket of the billiard-room. "Wants to go to bed, does he? Very well. I'll
go to him."

"He seems to be quite fatigued with his fascination about Lady Eustace."

"I call that woman a perfect god-send. What should we have done without
her?" This Lady Glencora said almost to herself as she prepared to join
the duke. The duke had only one more observation to make before he retired
for the night.

"I'm afraid, you know, that your friend hasn't what I call a good time
before her, Glencora."

In this opinion of the Duke of Omnium, the readers of this story will
perhaps agree.






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