His second return to the ancestral home was scarcely less disastrous than the first; a mortgage on his revenues as guardian of Lady Sue Aldmarshe just saved him this time from the pursuit of his creditors, and this mortgage he had only obtained through false statements as to his ward’s age.

As he told his sister-in-law a moment ago, he was at his last gasp.  He had perhaps just begun to realize that he would never succeed through the force of his own individuality.  Therefore, money had become a still more imperative necessity to him.  He was past forty now.  Disappointed ambition and an ever rebellious spirit had left severe imprints on his face:  his figure was growing heavy, his prominent lips, unadorned by a mustache, had an unpleasant downward droop, and lately he had even noticed that the hair on the top of his head was not so thick as of yore.

The situation was indeed getting desperate, since Lady Sue would be of age in three months, when all revenues for her maintenance would cease.

“Methinks her million will go to one of those young jackanapes who hang about her,” sighed Mistress de Chavasse, with almost as much bitterness as Sir Marmaduke had shown.

Her fortunes were in a sense bound up with those of her brother-in-law.  He had been most unaccountably kind to her of late, a kindness which his many detractors attributed either to an infatuation for his brother’s widow, or to a desire to further irritate his uncle the Earl of Northallerton, who—­a rigid Puritan himself—­hated the play-actress and her connection with his own family.

“Can naught be done, Marmaduke?” she asked after a slight pause, during which she had watched anxiously the restless figure of her brother-in-law as he paced up and down the narrow hall.

“Can you suggest anything, my dear Editha?” he retorted roughly.

“Pshaw!” she ejaculated with some impatience, “you are not so old, but you could have made yourself agreeable to the wench.”

“You think that she would have fallen in love with her middle-aged guardian?” he exclaimed with a harsh, sarcastic laugh.  “That girl? ... with her head full of romantic nonsense ... and I ... in ragged doublet, with a bald head, and an evil temper ...  Bah!!! ...  But,” he added, with an unpleasant sneer, “’tis unselfish and disinterested on your part, my dear Editha, even to suggest it.  Sue does not like you.  Her being mistress here would not be conducive to your comfort.”

“Nay! ’tis no use going on in this manner any longer, Marmaduke,” she said dejectedly.  “Pleasant times will not come my way so long as you have not a shilling to give me for a new gown, and cannot afford to keep up my house in London.”

She fully expected another retort from him—­brutal and unbridled as was his wont when money affairs were being discussed.  He was not accustomed to curb his violence in her presence.  She had been his helpmeet in many unavowable extravagances, in the days when he was still striving after a brilliant position in town.  There had been certain rumors anent a gambling den, whereat Mistress de Chavasse had been the presiding spirit and which had come under the watchful eye of my Lord Protector’s spies.