“She is captivated by his manner, as any girl might be, but I doubt whether she loves him.”

This impression, however, had always died out in a short time, and he had somehow come to accept the general opinion unquestioningly, that she would accept Carthew when he proposed.  He had been prepared to face the alternative of either suffering her to marry a scoundrel, or of taking a step more repugnant to him, which would probably end by an entire breach of his friendship with the Greendales, that of telling them this story.  He was therefore delighted to find that the difficulty had been solved by Bertha herself without his intervention, and felt absolutely grateful for the accident which had cost him the Queen’s Cup, but had at the same time opened Bertha’s eyes to the man’s true character.  Soon after two o’clock he went ashore in the gig, and at the half hour Lady Greendale and Bertha came down.

“The Osprey looks like a bird shorn of its wings,” he said, as he handed them into the boat; “and though the men have made everything as tidy as they could, the two missing spars quite spoil her appearance.”

“That does not matter in the least, Frank,” Lady Greendale said.  “We know how she looks when she is at her best.  We shall enjoy a quiet sail in her just as much as if she were in apple-pie order.”

“You look fagged, Lady Greendale, though you are pretty well accustomed to gaiety in town.”

Lady Greendale did indeed look worn and worried.  For the last two or three days, Bertha’s manner had puzzled her and caused her some vague anxiety.  That morning the girl had come in from the garden and told her that she had just refused Mr. Carthew, and, although she had never been pleased at the idea of Bertha’s marrying him, the refusal had come as a shock.

Personally she liked him.  She believed him to be very well off, but she had expected Bertha to do much better, and she by no means approved of his fondness for the turf.  She had been deeply disappointed at the girl’s refusal of Lord Chilson, on whom she had quite set her mind.  The second offer had also been a good one.  Still, she had reconciled herself to the thought of Bertha’s marrying Carthew.  His connection with the turf had certainly brought him into contact with a great many good men, he was to be met everywhere, and she could hardly wonder that Bertha should have been taken with his good looks and the brilliancy of his conversation.  The refusal, then, came to her not only as an absolute surprise, but as a shock.

She considered that Bertha had certainly given him, as well as everyone else, reason to suppose that she intended to accept him.  Many of her intimate friends had spoken to her as if the affair was already a settled matter, and when it became known that Bertha had refused him, she would be set down as a flirt, and it would certainly injure her prospects of making the sort of match that she desired.  She had said something of all this to the girl, and had only received the reply: