“She is that vulgar Lady Bellingham’s niece—or so they pretend,” answered Lady Mablethorpe, abandoning the vinaigrette. “You must know Eliza Bellingham! She keeps a gaming-house in St James’s Square.”

“One of the Archer-Buckingham kidney?”

“Precisely so. Well, I don’t say she is as bad as that precious pair, for, indeed, who could be?—but it’s all the same. She was Ned Bellingham’s wife, and I for one never thought her good ton at all, while we all know what Bellingham was!”

“I seem to be singularly ignorant.”

“Oh well, it was before your day! It doesn’t signify, for he’s been dead these fifteen years: drank himself into his grave, though they called it an inflammation of the lungs—fiddle! Of course he left her with a pile of debts, just as anyone might have expected. I’m sure I don’t know how she contrived to live until she started her wretched gaming-house: I daresay she might have rich relatives. But that’s neither here nor there. You may see her everywhere; she rents her box at the opera, even! but no person of ton will recognize her.”

“How does she fill her house, then? I suppose it is the usual thing?—discreet cards of invitation, handsome supper, any quantity of inferior wine, E.O. and faro-tables set out abovestairs?”

“I was referring to ladies of breeding,” said his aunt coldly. “It is well known, alas, that gentlemen will go anywhere for the sake of gaming!”

He made her a slight, ironical bow. “Also, if my memory serves me, Lady Sarah Repton.”

“I make no excuse for Sally. But duke’s daughter or not, I should never think of describing her as of good ton!”

He looked faintly amused. “I wish you will enlighten me: do you recognize her?”

“Don’t be absurd, I beg of you! Naturally Sally has the entree everywhere. Eliza Bellingham is quite another matter, and you may depend upon it that although Sally may go to her house, she does not set foot in Sally’s! It was Sally who warned me of what was going forward. As you may suppose, I immediately taxed Adrian with it.”

“That is what I supposed,” agreed Mr Ravenscar, looking sardonic.

Lady Mablethorpe cast him a glance of scornful dislike. “You need not imagine that I am a fool, Max. Of course I went tactfully about the business, never supposing for an instant that I should discover the affair to be more than a—than a—Well, you know what anyone would expect, hearing that a young man had become enamoured of a wench from a gaming-house! You may conceive my dismay when Adrian at once, and without the least hesitation, informed me that he was indeed madly in love with the girl, and meant to marry her! Max, I was so taken aback that I could not utter a word!”

“Has he taken leave of his senses?” demanded Mr Ravenscar.

“He is just like his father,” said Lady Mablethorpe, in a despairing way. “Depend upon it, he has taken some romantic maggot into his head! You know how he was for ever reading tales of chivalry, and such nonsense, when he was a boy! This is what comes of it! I wish I had sent him to Eton.”

Mr Ravenscar raised his eyes, and thoughtfully contemplated the portrait which hung on the wall opposite to him. It depicted a young man in a blue coat, who looked out of the picture with a faint smile in his fine eyes. He was a handsome young man, hardly more than a boy. He wore his own fair hair tied in the nape of his neck, and supported his chin on one slender, beautiful hand. His expression was one of great sweetness, but there was a hint of obstinacy in the curve of his lips, at odd variance with the dreamy softness of his eyes.

Lady Mablethorpe followed the direction of her nephew’s gaze, and herself studied, with misgiving, the portrait of the 4th Viscount. A despondent sigh escaped her; she transferred her attention to Mr Ravenscar. “What’s to be done, Max?” she asked.

“He can’t marry the wench.”

“Will you speak to him?”

“Certainly not.”

“It is very difficult to do so, I own, but he might be brought to attend to you.”

“I can conceive of nothing more unlikely. What figure will you go to buy the girl off?”

“No sacrifice would be too great to save my son from such an entanglement! I shall rely on you, for I know nothing of such matters. Only rescue the poor boy!”

“It will go very much against the grain,” said Ravenscar grimly.

Lady Mablethorpe stiffened. “Indeed! Pray, what may you mean by that?”

“A constitutional dislike of being bled, ma’am.”

“Oh!” she said, relaxing. “You may console yourself with the reflection that it is I, not you, being bled.”

“It is a slight consolation,” he admitted.

“I have not the least doubt that you will find the girl rapacious. Sally tells me that she is at least five years older than Adrian.”

“She’s a fool if she accepts less than ten thousand,” said Ravenscar.

Lady Mablethorpe’s jaw dropped. “Max!”

He shrugged. “Adrian is not precisely a pauper, my dear aunt. There is also the title. Ten thousand.”

“It seems wicked!”

“It is wicked.”

“I should like to strangle the abominable creature!”

“Unfortunately, the laws of this land preclude your pursuing that admirable course.”

“We shall have to pay,” she said, in a hollow voice. “It would be useless, I am persuaded, to appeal to the woman.”

“You would make a great mistake to betray so much weakness.”

“Nothing would induce me to speak to such a woman! Only fancy, Max! She presides over the tables in that horrid house! You may imagine what a bold, vulgar piece she is! Sally says that all the worst rakes in town go there, and she bestows her favours on such men as that dreadful Lord Ormskirk. He is for ever at her side. I daresay she is more to him than my deluded boy dreams of. But it is useless to suggest such a thing! He fired up in an instant.”

“Ormskirk, eh?” said Ravenscar thoughtfully. “That settles it: any attempt to bring to reasonable terms a lady in the habit of encouraging his attentions would certainly be doomed to failure. I had thought better of Adrian.”

“You can’t blame him,” said Lady Mablethorpe. “What experience has he had of such people? Ten to one, the girl told him some affecting story about herself! Besides, she is quite lovely, according to what Sally Repton says. I suppose there is no hope of her deciding in Ormskirk’s favour?”

“Not the smallest chance of it, I imagine. Ormskirk won’t marry her.”

Lady Mablethorpe showed signs of dissolving into tears. “Oh, Max, what is to be done if she won’t relinquish him?”

“She must be made to relinquish him.”

“If it were not for the unsettled state of everything on the Continent, I should feel inclined to send him abroad! Only I daresay he would refuse to go.”

“Very likely.”

Lady Mablethorpe dabbed at her eyes. “It would kill me if my son were to be caught by such a female!”

“I doubt it, but you need not put yourself about, ma’am. He will not be caught by her.”

She was a little comforted by this pronouncement. “I knew I could rely upon you, Max! What do you mean to do?”

“See the charmer for myself,” he replied. “St James’s Square, you said?”

“Yes, but you know how careful these houses have to be, Max, on account of the law-officers. I daresay they won’t admit you, if you have no card.”

“Not admit the rich Mr Ravenscar?” he said cynically. “My dear aunt! I shall be welcomed with open arms.”

“Well, I hope they won’t fleece you,” said Lady Mablethorpe. “On the contrary, you hope they will,” he retorted. “But I am a very ill bird for plucking!

“If Adrian meets you there, he will suspect your purpose. He will certainly think that I sent you.”

“Deny it,” said Ravenscar, bored.

Lady Mablethorpe started to deliver herself of an improving lecture on the evils of deception, but, finding that her nephew was quite unimpressed, stopped, and said with a somewhat vindictive note in her voice: “I beg that you will take care, Max! They say the girl is like a honey-pot, and I’m sure I’ve no wish to see you caught in her toils.”

He laughed. “There is not the slightest need for you to concern yourself about me, ma’am. I am neither twenty years of age, nor of a romantic disposition. You had better not tell Adrian that I have been here. No doubt I shall see him in St James’s Square this evening.”

She held out her hand to him, a good deal mollified. “You are a most provoking man, Max, but indeed I don’t know what I should do without you! You will manage it all. I depend entirely upon you!”

“For once,” said Mr Ravenscar, raising her hand formally to his lips, “you may quite safely do so.”

He took his leave of her, and departed. She opened her book again, but sat for a few moments gazing into the fire, her mind pleasantly occupied with daydreams. Once extricated from his present predicament, she had great hopes that her son would have learnt his lesson, and keep clear of any further entanglements. The account Ravenscar had brought of his half-sister’s activities had not been entirely palatable, but Lady Mablethorpe was a broad-minded woman, disinclined to set much store by the vagaries of a young lady of only eighteen summers. To be sure, it was unfortunate that Arabella should be such a flirt, but what, in another damsel, would have been a shocking fault, was, in such a notable heiress, a mere whimsicality of youth. Flirt or not, Lady Mablethorpe had every intention of seeing Arabella married to her son. Nothing, she thought, could be more suitable. Arabella had birth, fortune, and prettiness; she had known her cousin intimately since babyhood, and would make him a very good wife. Lady Mablethorpe had not the smallest objection to the child’s liveliness: she thought it very taking, coupled, as it had always been, with a graceful, playful deference towards her aunt.