“What nonsense, Selina!  Don’t say that.”

“But it’s true, Fanny; I have not; and Grey Abbey has become distasteful to him because we are all sedate, steady people.  Perhaps some would call us dull, and heavy; and I have grieved that it should be so, though I cannot alter my nature; but you are so much the contrary—­there is so much in your character like his own, before he became fond of the world, that I feel he can become attached to and fond of you; and I am delighted to see that he thinks so himself.  What do you think of him, now that you have seen more of him than you ever did before?”

“Indeed,” said Fanny, “I like him very much.”

“He is very clever, isn’t he?  He might have been anything if he had given himself fair play.  He seems to have taken greatly to you.”

“Oh yes; we are great friends:”  and then Fanny paused—­“so great friends,” she continued, looking somewhat gravely in Lady Selina’s face, “that I mean to ask the greatest favour of him that I could ask of anyone:  one I am sure I little dreamed I should ever ask of him.”

“What is it, Fanny?  Is it a secret?”

“Indeed it is, Selina; but it’s a secret I will tell you.  I mean to tell him all I feel about Lord Ballindine, and I mean to ask him to see him for me.  Adolphus has offered to be a brother to me, and I mean to take him at his word.”

Lady Selina turned very pale, and looked very grave as she replied,

“That is not giving him a brother’s work, Fanny.  A brother should protect you from importunity and insult, from injury and wrong; and that, I am sure, Adolphus would do:  but no brother would consent to offer your hand to a man who had neglected you and been refused, and who, in all probability, would now reject you with scorn if he has the opportunity—­or if not that, will take you for your money’s sake.  That, Fanny, is not a brother’s work; and it is an embassy which I am sure Adolphus will not undertake.  If you take my advice you will not ask him.”

As Lady Selina finished speaking she walked to the door, as if determined to hear no reply from her cousin; but, as she was leaving the room, she fancied that she heard her sobbing, and her heart softened, and she again turned towards her and said, “God knows, Fanny, I do not wish to be severe or ill-natured to you; I would do anything for your comfort and happiness, but I cannot bear to think that you should”—­Lady Selina was puzzled for a word to express her meaning—­“that you should forget yourself,” and she attempted to put her arm round Fanny’s waist.

But she was mistaken; Fanny was not sobbing, but was angry; and what Selina now said about her forgetting herself, did not make her less so.