The younger of the doting old maids went downstairs again to the drawing-room, where her sister was already seated behind the tea-table. Miss Wendover, after one glance at her carriage-dress, with its rucked sleeves and its little winged ruff of starched muslin, greeted her with instant approval, exclaiming: “I never saw you look so becoming! London, of course?”

“Yes: Mary was so obliging as to take me to her very own Therese, which I thought excessively good-natured of her.”

“Therese! I daresay it was shockingly dear, then, because Cornelia once said to me—so spiteful of her!—that it was to be hoped George might not be ruined by Mary’s extravagance, and that she couldn’t afford to have her dresses made by Therese.”

“Could, but won’t,” said Abby, sipping her tea. “How happy James must be to have a wife who is as big a nip-farthing as he is himself!”

“Oh, Abby, how can you? Remember, he is your brother!”

“I do, and never cease to regret it!” retorted Abby. “Now, don’t, I beg of you, recite me a catalogue of his virtues, for they don’t render him any more lovable—less, in fact! Besides, he’s an incorrigible busy-head, and I’m quite out of charity with him.”

Selina had been uttering soft clucking sounds of protest, but they ceased at this, and she demanded quite sharply: “Has James written to you too?”

“Written to me! He actually came up to London to read me one of his pompous lectures! My dear, what have you been doing here? Who is this ramshackle youth who has been making up to Fanny?”

“No such thing!” declared Selina, her colour much heightened. “It was a case of love at first sight—and a very pretty-behaved young man! Only think of his running out of the Pump Room, with no umbrella, to procure a chair for me, and becoming drenched, because you know what it is in Bath when it suddenly comes on to rain, there is never a chair or a hackney to be had, and I was persuaded he would take a chill, which would settle on his lungs, but he made nothing of it—so very obliging! And he had not then exchanged one word with Fanny, because she wasn’t with me, and although I remembered that I had seen him in the Upper Rooms two—no, three—days before, he did not, and Fanny was with me on that occasion, so if you are thinking that he got the chair for me because he wished to become acquainted with her you are quite mistaken, Abby! If that had been his object he would have desired Mr King to have introduced him to us, at the Upper Rooms. And,”she concluded, with the air of one delivering a clincher: “he is not a youth! I daresay he is as old as you are, and very likely older!”

Abby could not help laughing at this tangled speech, but she shook her head as well, and sighed: “Oh, Selina, you goosecap!”

“I collect you mean to reproach me,” said Selina, sitting very straight in her chair, “but why you should do so I haven’t the least guess, for Fanny had a great many admirers before you went away, and when I said she was too young to be going to balls, you said I was Gothic,and also that she would enjoy her London come-out much more if she had previously been into society a little, which is perfectly true, because there is nothing so—so agonizing as to be fired off from the schoolroom, no matter how many dancing and deportment lessons one has had! Particularly if one is a trifle shy—not that I mean to say that Fanny is shy—indeed, I sometimes wonder if she is not a little too—though never unbecomingly! And if James has been tattling to you, depend upon it that odious woman who is Cornelia’s bosom-piece—which is just what one would expect of Cornelia, to make a crony of a backbiting creature like Mrs Ruscombe!—well, you may depend upon it that it was she who set him on, because Mr Calverleigh never greets that tallow-faced daughter of hers with more than common civility, in spite of having been regularly introduced, and receiving every encouragement to dangle after the girl!”

“Yes, very likely,” agreed Abby.

“There, then!” said Selina triumphantly.

There was no immediate response to this, but, after a few moments, Abigail said: “If that were all—but it isn’t, Selina! George isn’t a backbiter, and he spoke of Calverleigh with the greatest contempt, because he thought it right to warn me that the young man is not at all the thing. Besides being a gamester, it seems that he is what they call a gazetted fortune-hunter. In fact, the on-dit is that Fanny is not the first heiress he has made up to: there was some silly girl who was ready to elope with him, if you please, only last year! Fortunately, the plot was discovered, and the whole affair hushed up.”

“I don’t believe it!” declared Selina, trembling with indignation. “No, and I wonder that George should repeat such—such steward’s room gossip! Not the thing,indeed! I consider him most truly the gentleman, and of the first respectability, and so does everyone else in Bath!”

“Oh, Selina, what a bouncer! You know very well that Lady Trevisian didn’t hold him in high esteem. Indeed, she told Mary that she had warned you, just before she left Bath, that you would be wise to hint Calverleigh away. That was how George came to know about the business.”

Much flushed, Selina said: “I wonder that she could think of nothing better to do than to go tattle mongering all over London! Making a mountain out of a molehill, too, as I very soon discovered—not that I mean to say that it was not very wrong of Fanny, and I assure you I told her so—and all because she saw Fanny walking with him in the Sydney Gardens, quite by accident—meeting him, I mean, and Betty with her, of course—at least, she was then—so I gave Fanny a severe scold, and told her how shocking it would be if people thought she was fast. Yes, and I said that I was surprised at Mr Calverleigh, which I collect she must have told him, because he paid me a morning visit the very next day, to beg pardon, and to explain to me that this was the first time he had ever been to Bath, which accounted for his not knowing that it was quite improper for a young female of breeding to wander round the gardens—to say nothing of the labyrinth!—without the vestige of a chaperon, not even her maid, because Fanny had sent Betty home, which was very naughty of her—most thoughtless, only she is such a child still that I’m persuaded she had no notion—and he,I promise you, felt it just as he ought!”

“Did he?” said the younger Miss Wendover rather dryly. “Well, you can’t suppose that I mean to make a mountain out of a molehill! But the thing is, Selina, that however engaging Calverleigh may be he will not do for Fanny. If George, who is far too good-natured to abuse people merely because he doesn’t like them, calls him a loose fish, which I fancy means a libertine—”

“Abby! Oh, No!”exclaimed Selina, outraged.

“Well, there must be something very undesirable about him to bring James posting up to London in the greatest fuss imaginable!”

“Yes, because he wants poor Fanny to make a brilliant match! I hope I know how to value my brother as I ought, but I must say that I think he has a maggot in his head on that subject!”

“It was more than that,” Abby said slowly, a frown creasing her brow. “He seemed to me to be almost overpowered! Indeed, he couldn’t utter the name without shuddering! I could have laughed, if he hadn’t put me so much out of temper. For what must he do, when I asked him why he held Calverleigh in such violent dislike, but prim up his mouth, and say that it was not a matter fit for my ears! I must be content to abide by his judgment, and if I did not nip the affair in the bud there would be nothing for it but to remove Fanny from our care.”

“What?” Selina gasped.

“Don’t fall into despair, my love!” said Abby, smiling at her. “He may talk of removing Fanny to his—or, rather, her—own home, but I fancy he would meet with some sturdy opposition from Cornelia! If he overbore it I’m sure it would be for the first time in his life!”

“It would be the cruellest thing! She would be miserable!” uttered Selina, in palpitating accents.

“Oh, she would run away!” replied Abby cheerfully. “I told him so, which gave him the chance to deplore her upbringing. However, before we got to actual dagger-drawing—”

“You should not! Oh, dear, oh, dear, how often has dear Mama begged you not to be so—so impetuous?”

“No, of course I should not, but there was no harm done, because Mary was there, and I defy anyone to brangle in the teeth of her placid good sense! She said, in her sweetly comfortable way,—you know, Selina!—what a to-do was being made over a flirtation, which would never grow to serious proportions if James would but refrain from turning it into a grand tragedy, and so putting it into Fanny’s head that she was a modern Juliet. James was a good deal struck by this, and so was I, too!” She broke off, perceiving that her sister did not share her sentiments. “You don’t agree?”

Her mild eyes filling with sentimental tears, Selina said, in a trembling voice: “How can you be so unfeeling ? When you have said I don’t know how many times that our darling should never be sacrificed as you were! When I recall your sufferings—when I think of your—of your blighted life—”

“Selina, have you run mad ?” interrupted Abby, regarding her in astonishment. “What sufferings?”

“You may try to hoax me, but you won’t make me believe that you have forgotten your anguish when Papa forbade poor Mr Thornaby ever to approach you again! I shall never do so!” declared Selina.