“True! Or even with the fascinating Calverleigh!”

“Now, Abby—”

“Well, it would be,” said Abby candidly. “Any girl would prefer the company of a taking young man to that of her aunt! But it won’t do, Selina.”

“I am persuaded that when you have made his acquaintance—not that I would for a moment encourage her—oh, dear how very affecting it is! You will have to tell her, for I know I could never bring myself to do so!”

“Dearest, it isn’t so dreadful that you need fall into affliction! It’s certainly unfortunate, and I wish with all my heart that she might have been spared such a painful disappointment, but she’ll recover from it. As for forbidding her to see Calverleigh, or telling her the things that are said of him, I’m not such a widgeon! She would fly to his defence! But if he were to draw off? Not compelled to do so, but because he discovered her to be not such a rich plum as he had supposed ? She might suffer a little unhappiness, but not for long. She’s not the girl to wear the willow for a mere flirt!” She added thoughtfully: “And she couldn’t, under those circumstances, fancy herself to be a star-crossed lover, could she ? I do feel that that should be avoided at all costs, for although I’ve never been star-crossed myself I can readily perceive how romantic it would be. Selina, I never knew Fanny’s mother at all well, but you must have done so. Was she high-spirited, like Fanny? Rather too dashing, perhaps, to suit the Wendover notions of propriety?”

“Celia? Good gracious, no!” replied Selina. “She was very pretty—quite lovely, when she was a girl, but she went off sadly, which I do hope and pray Fanny won’t, because she is very like her in countenance,and Mama always was used to say that fair beauties seldom wear well. But Fanny isn’t in the least like her in disposition! She has so much liveliness, and poor Celia was a very quiet, shy girl, and most persuadable! What makes you ask me about her?”

“Something James said. I wasn’t paying much heed, but it was something about Fanny’s too close resemblance to her mother. And then he stopped short, and when I asked him what he meant he fobbed me off, saying that Fanny was as foolish as her mother. But I didn’t think he did mean that, and nor did Mary. She remembers more than I do, of course, and she tells me that you elder ones always thought that something had happened—some indiscretion, perhaps—”

“I never thought any such thing!” intervened Selina firmly. “And if I had I should have considered it most improper to have pried into it! If Mama had wished me to know anything about it, she would have told me!”

“So there was something!” said Abby. “A skeleton in our respectable cupboard! I wish I could know what it was! But I daresay it would prove to be no more than the skeleton of a mouse.”

Chapter II

Not long after eleven o’clock that evening, a gentle tap on the door of Abby’s bedchamber was followed immediately by the entrance of Miss Fanny Wendover, who first peeped cautiously into the room, and then, when she saw her aunt seated at the dressing-table, uttered a joyful squeak, and ran to fling herself into the arms held out to her, exclaiming: “You aren’t in bed and asleep! I told Grimston you wouldn’t be! Oh, how glad I am to see you again! how much I’ve missed you, dear, dear Abby!”

It would not have surprised Abby if she had been greeted with reserve, even with the wary, half-defiant manner of one expectant of censure and ready to defend herself; but there was no trace of consciousness in the welcome accorded her, and nothing but affection in the beautiful eyes which, as Fanny sank down at her feet, clasping her hands, were raised so innocently to hers.

“It’s horrid without you!” Fanny said, giving her hands a squeeze. “You can’t think!”

Abby bent to drop a kiss on her check, but said with mock sympathy: “My poor darling! So strict and unkind as Aunt Selina has been! I feared it would be so.”

“That’s what I’ve missed so much!” Fanny said, with a ripple of mirth. “I am most sincerely attached to Aunt Selina, but—but she is not a great jokesmith, is she? And not a bit corky!”

“I shouldn’t think so,” responded Abby cautiously. “Not that I know what corky means, but it sounds very unlike Selina—and, I may add, sadly unlike the language to be expected of a girl of genteel upbringing!”

That made Fanny’s eyes dance. “Yes—slang! It means—oh, bright, and lively! Like you!”

“Does it indeed? I collect you mean to pay me a handsome compliment, but if ever you dare to attach such an epithet to me again, Fanny, I shall—I shall—well, I don’t yet know what I shall do, but you may depend upon it that it will be something terrible! Corky! Good God!”

“I won’t,” Fanny promised. “Now, do, do be serious, beloved! I have so much to tell you. Something of—of the first importance.”

Abby knew a craven impulse to fob her off, but subdued it, saying in what she hoped was not a hollow voice: “No, have you? Then I will engage to be perfectly serious. What is it?”

Fanny directed a searching look at her. “Didn’t Aunt Selina—or Uncle James, perhaps—tell you about—about Mr Calverleigh?”

“About Mr—? Oh! Is he the London smart you’ve slain with one dart from your eyes? To be sure they did, and very diverting I thought them! That is to say,” she corrected herself, in a ludicrously severe tone, “that of course they are very right in thinking you to be far too young to be setting up a flirt! Most forward of you, my love—quite improper!”

She won no answering gleam. “It isn’t like that,” Fanny said. “From the very first moment that we met—” She paused, and drew a long breath. “We loved one another!” she blurted out.

Abby had not expected such an open avowal, and could think of nothing to say but that it sounded like a fairy-tale, which was not at all what she ought to have said, as she realized an instant later.

Raising glowing eyes to her face, Fanny said simply: “Yes, it is just like that! Oh, I knew you would understand, dearest! Even though you haven’t yet met him! And when you do meet him—oh, you will dote on him! I only wish you may not cut me out!”

Abby accorded this sally the tribute of a smile, but recommended her ecstatic niece not to be a pea-goose.

“Oh, I was only funning!” Fanny assured her. “The thing is that he isn’t a silly boy, like Jack Weaverham, or Charlie Ruscombe, or—or Peter Trevisian, but a man of the world, and much older than I am, which makes it so particularly gratifying—no, I don’t mean that!—so wonderful that in spite of having been on the town, as they say, for years and years he never met anyone with whom he wished to form a lasting connection until he came to Bath, and met me!” Overcome by this reflection, she buried her face in Abby’s lap, saying, in muffled accents: “And he must have met much prettier girls than I am—don’t you think?”

Miss Wendover, aware that her besetting sin was a tendency to give utterance to the first thought which sprang to her mind, swallowed an impulse to retort: “But few so well-endowed!” and replied instead: “Well, as I’m not acquainted with any of the latest beauties I can’t say! But to have made a London beau your first victim is certainly a triumph. Of course I know I shouldn’t say that to you—your Aunt Cornelia would call it administering to your vanity!—so pray don’t expose me to her censure by growing puffed-up, my darling!”

Fanny looked up. “Ah, you don’t understand! Abby, this is a—a lasting attachment! You must believe that! Has my uncle told you that he is a desperate flirt? Such a sad reputation as he has! He told me so himself! But I don’t care a rush, because, although he has frequently fancied himself to be in love, he never wished to marry anyone until he met me! And if my uncle said that he is a trifle rackety he might have spared his breath, for Stacy told me that too. He said—oh, Abby, he said he wasn’t fit to touch my hand, and no one could blame my uncle if he refused to give his consent to our marriage!”

She once more hid her face in Abby’s lap, raising it again to add: “So you see—!”

Abby thought that she did, but she only said, stroking the golden head on her knee: “But what is there in all this to cast you into agitation? Anyone would suppose that your uncle had already refused his consent, and had threatened you both with dire penalties into the bargain!”

“Oh!” breathed Fanny, looking eagerly up at her. “Do you mean that you think he won’t refuse it?”

“Oh, no!” said Abby. “I am very sure that he will! And although I have no very high opinion of his judgment I give him credit for not being such a niddicock as to accept the first offer made to him for your hand! A pretty guardian he would be if he allowed you to become riveted before your first season! Yes, I know that sets up all your bristles, my darling, and makes you ready to pull caps with me, but I beg you won’t! Your uncle may dream of a splendid alliance for you, but you know that I don’t! I only dream of a happy one.”

“I know—oh, I know!” Fanny declared. “And so you will support me! Best of my aunts, say that you will!”

“Why, yes, if you can convince me that your first love will also be your last love!”

“But I have told you!” Fanny said, sitting back on her heels, and staring at her in rising indignation. “I could never love anyone as I love Stacy! Good God, how can you—you!—talk like that to me? I know—my aunt told me!—how my grandfather repulsed the man you loved! And you’ve never loved another, and—and your life was ruined!”