“I wish Miss Gresley would come and stay here instead of taking you away from me,” she said, plaintively, to Rachel one morning, when she made the disagreeable discovery that Rachel and Hester were friends.  “I don’t care much about her myself, she is so profane and so dreadfully irreligious.  But Edward likes to talk to her.  He prefers artificial people.  I wonder he did not marry her.  That old cat, Lady Susan Gresley, was always throwing her at his head.  I wish she was not always persuading you to leave me for hours together.  I get so frightened when I am left alone with Edward.  I live in perpetual dread that he will say something before the children or the servants.  He is quite cruel enough.”

“He will never say anything.”

“You are always so decided, Rachel.  You don’t see possibilities, and you don’t know him as I do.  He is capable of anything.  I will write a note now, and you can take it to Miss Gresley, if you must go there to-day.”

“I wish to go very much.”

“And you will stay another week whether she comes or not?”

There was a momentary pause before Rachel said, cheerfully, “I will stay another week, with pleasure.  But I am afraid Lord Newhaven will turn restive at taking me in to dinner.”

“Oh! he likes you.  He always prefers people who are not of his own family.”

Rachel laughed.  “You flatter me.”

“I never flatter any one.  He does like you, and, besides, there are people coming next week for the grouse-shooting.  I suppose that heavy young Vernon is going to lumber over with you.  It’s not my fault if he is always running after you.  Edward insisted on having him.  I don’t want him to dance attendance on me.”

“He and I are going to bicycle to Warpington together.  The Gresleys are cousins of his.  If it turns very hot we will wait till after sunset to return, if we may.”

“Just as you like,” said Lady Newhaven with asperity.  “But I advise you to be careful, my dear Rachel.  It never seems to occur to you what on-lookers see at a glance, namely, that Mr. Vernon is in love with your fortune.”

“According to public opinion that is a very praiseworthy attachment,” said Rachel, who had had about enough.  “I often hear it commended.”

Lady Newhaven stared.  That her conversation could have the effect of a mustard leaf did not strike her.  She saw that Rachel was becoming restive, and, of course, the reason was obvious.  She was thinking of marrying Dick.

“Well, my dear,” she said, lying down on a low couch near the latticed window, and opening a novel, “you need not be vexed with me for trying to save you from a mercenary marriage.  I only speak because I am fond of you.  But one marriage is as good as another.  I was married for love myself; I had not a farthing.  And yet you see my marriage has turned out a tragedy—­a bitter, bitter tragedy.”

Tableau.—­A beautiful, sad-faced young married woman in white, reclining among pale-green cushions near a bowl of pink carnations, endeavoring to rouse the higher feelings of an inexperienced though not youthful spinster in a short bicycling skirt.  Decidedly, the picture was not flattering to Rachel.