’Should I not, Lady Maulevrier?  It was my only chance of being loved for my own sake; or, at least of knowing that I was so loved.  If I had come with my rank and my fortune in my hand, as it were—­one of the good matches of the year—­what security could I ever have felt in the disinterested love of the girl who chose me?  As plain John Hammond I wooed and was rejected; as plain John Hammond I wooed and won; and the prize which I so won is a pearl above price.  Not for worlds, were the last year to be lived over again, would I have one day of my life altered.’

’Well, I suppose I ought to be satisfied, I wanted you for Lesbia, and I have got you for Mary.  Best of all, I have got you for myself.  Ronald Hollister’s son is mine; he is of my kin; he belongs to me; he will not forsake me in life; he will be near me, God grant, when I die.’

‘Dear Lady Maulevrier, as far as in me lies, I will be to you as a son,’ said Lord Hartfield, very solemnly, stooping to kiss her hand.

Mary came away from her tea-table to embrace her grandmother.

‘It makes me so happy to have won a little of your regard,’ she murmured, ‘and to know that I have married a man whom you can love.’

‘Of course you have heard of Lesbia’s engagement?’ Lady Maulevrier said presently, when they were taking their tea.

‘Maulevrier wrote to us about it.’

‘To us.’  How nice it sounded, thought Mary, as if they were a firm, and a letter written to one was written to both.

‘And do you know this Mr. Smithson?’

‘Not intimately.  I have met him at the Carlton.’

’I am told that he is very much esteemed by your party, and that he is very likely to get a peerage when this Ministry goes out of office.’

’That is not improbable.  Peerages are to be had if a man is rich enough; and Smithson is supposed to be inordinately rich.’

‘I hope he has character as well as money,’ said Lady Maulevrier, gravely.  ’But do you think a man can become inordinately rich in a short time, with unblemished honour?’

‘We are told that nothing is impossible,’ answered Hartfield.  ’Faith can remove a mountain; only one does not often see it done.  However, I believe Mr. Smithson’s character is fairly good as millionaires go.  We do not inquire too closely into these things nowadays.’

Lady Maulevrier sighed and held her peace.  She remembered the day when she had protested vehemently, passionately, against Lesbia’s marriage with a poor man.  And now she had an unhappy feeling about Mr. Smithson’s wealth, a doubt, a dread that all might not be well with those millions, that some portion of that golden tide might flow from impure sources.  She had lived remote from the world, but she had read the papers diligently, and she knew how often the splendour of commercial wealth has been suddenly obscured behind a black cloud of obloquy.  She could not rejoice heartily at the idea of Lesbia’s engagement.