“Very true. Those brothers, too, are as expensive a pair as you may meet! I was talking to Horley about them, and received a very ill account of them. Tell me, my dear boy: dc you feel yourself in honour bound to support Phoebe’s family?”

“No, I do not,” said his lordship bluntly. “They have all of them behaved damnably to her, and it is my intention to have nothing more to do with them, after we are married, than we must. I might do something for the younger girls, if Phoebe liked,” he added magniloquently.

“Famous! I was beginning to fear that I had served you an ill turn by casting you into Phoebe’s arms. But this is excellent!”

“Yes, but the thing is, Deb, that the Laxtons are not likely to consider my offer beside Filey’s. I could not, if I would, do what he might for the family. It means nothing to him: he has almost as much money as Max!”

“That may be, but if Phoebe refuses to marry Filey her parents will be only too glad to discover that she has another, and very eligible suitor at hand.”

Lord Mablethorpe looked rather sceptical, and took another turn about the room. After a pause, he said with some hesitation: “There is another thing, Deb. I did not tell you, but my mother has always had a notion that I might marry my cousin Arabella one day. She is a great heiress, you know. She won’t like it at all if she learns that I mean instead to marry Phoebe Laxton. Phoebe has no more than three or four thousand pounds coming to her, I dare say: not that that would signify to my mother once she has put the idea of my marrying Arabella out of her head: but she don’t like Lady Laxton, and I am very much afraid that she will not like the match at all. I don’t mean that she won’t come round when she knows Phoebe, but—well, it may take a little time, because once she takes a notion into her head. Well, I daresay you know what I mean! When I am of age, I can do as I please, but until then I don’t see how I am to offer for Phoebe, in the proper way, when my mother will very likely oppose the match. I was thinking of Max, too.”

“Pray, what has he to say to it?” demanded Miss Grantham.

“He is not my guardian, but he is one of my trustees, and the thing is that my mother usually attends to him, and although he is the best fellow in the world, I do feel that he will not at all approve of this, on account of the Laxtons being so done-up, you know. He will be afraid that I shall be bled by them, and it will be of no avail for me to assure him that I don’t mean to be, because he thinks I am just a boy, and can be imposed upon.”

Miss Grantham was silent for a moment. Privately, she thought that Lady Mablethorpe and Mr Ravenscar would be too relieved to hear that Adrian no longer meant to marry herself to raise any very serious objection to his proposed alliance with a young lady of good birth and unexceptionable manners; but she was by no means anxious that Mr Ravenscar should learn of Adrian’s escape from her toils before she had recovered her aunt’s bills, or adequately punished him for his odious conduct. She said, therefore: “You mean that the matter must be kept secret until you come of age?”

“I think it would be less disagreeable for Phoebe,” he said. “I might talk my mother over, but I dread the thought of what Phoebe might be made to undergo at Lady Laxton’s hands if I did not. I mean to offer for her with all the propriety in the world, but if I am refused permission to address her I shall marry her out of hand, even if it means running all the way to Gretna Green to do it!”

She smiled. “Bravo! Meanwhile, what is to be done? Am I to keep her with me, or do we send her to stay with her aunt?”

He stopped short in his tracks, an arrested expression in his face. “I had forgot her aunt! Deb, I believe I should journey into Wales to see her, and to beg for her support! What do you think?”

“It seems to me an excellent plan. She may well be able to assist you. In the meantime, I will keep Phoebe here, where she will be quite safe, depend upon it! You will not mention the matter to your mother, or to your cousin, until things are in a way to be settled.”

He grasped her hands gratefully. “You are the best of creatures, Deb! I do not know where we should be without you! I will come round tomorrow to talk the thing over with Phoebe, and to learn her aunt’s direction.”

She agreed to this, and he then took his leave of her, going home with his head in the clouds, so divorced from earthly considerations that he quite forgot to think out a convincing reason to account for his absence all day to his anxious parent. The result of this oversight was that he blurted out the truth when she questioned him, and then felt very guilty, because Lady Mablethorpe at once expressed her intention of calling in Grosvenor Square the very next morning to favour Mr Ravenscar with her opinion of his wicked callousness in exposing her only son to all the risks of curricle-racing.

On the following day, Miss Laxton stationed herself soon after breakfast at the window in the Yellow Saloon, to watch for Lord Mablethorpe’s arrival, while Miss Grantham went to her aunt’s dressing-room to see how that afflicted lady did.

Lady Bellingham’s spirits had undergone a further buffet by the arrival of a bill from her milliner. She had just thrust this iniquitous document into Deborah’s hands when her black page scratched on the door, and, upon being told to come in, handed a packet to Miss Grantham on a silver tray.

She picked it up, recognizing Mr Ravenscar’s bold fist, and observing that it had been brought round by hand, asked the boy if art answer was expected. No, he said: the messenger had not waited for any answer.

She dismissed him, and broke the seal, spreading open the stiff sheet of paper. A slim sheaf of bills was disclosed and, attached to them, one of Mr Ravenscar’s visiting-cards, with a curt message written across the top of it.

“With my compliments,” she read, and sat staring at the card in stunned silence.

Lady Bellingham eyed her with misgiving. “What is it, my love?” she asked uneasily. “Who is it from?”

Miss Grantham said, in a voice which did not seem to belong to her: “It is from Mr Ravenscar.”

Lady Bellingham gave a moan, and reached for her smelling salts. “I knew it! Tell me the worst at once! He is going to have us all arrested!”

“No,” said Miss Grantham. “No.” She handed the packet to her aunt, feeling quite unable to say anything more.

Lady Bellingham took the packet in a gingerly fashion, but when she saw what it contained, she dropped her smelling salts, and ejaculated: “Deb! Deb, he has sent them!”

“I know,” said Miss Grantham.

“They are all here!” declared her ladyship, sorting them with trembling fingers. “Even the mortgage, my love! Oh, was there ever anything so providential? But—but why has he done it? Don’t tell me you have been teaching him anything dreadful”

Miss Grantham shook her head. “I can’t think why he has done it, aunt.”

“Did you tell him you would not marry Mablethorpe, and don’t care to own it to me? That is it!”

“It is not, ma’am. I told him I would marry Mablethorpe. I said I would ruin him, too.”

“Then I don’t understand it at all,” said Lady Bellingham, laying the packet down on her dressing-table. “You don’t suppose, do you, my love, that he can have misunderstood you?”

“I am very sure he did not. But what is to be done?”

“Done, my dear?” repeated her ladyship. “Well, I think you should write him a pretty letter, thanking him for his goodness in restoring my bills. I must say it is most obliging of him! I never supposed that he would do so, for they say he is abominably close! But I shall tell anyone who says that to me again that it is not so at all!”

Miss Grantham pressed her hands to her cheeks. “My dear ma’am, you cannot think that I would accept this generosity! It is impossible! What am I to do?”

Lady Bellingham’s eyes started with horror. She caught up the packet and clasped it to her bosom. “Not accept it?” she gasped. “After all the trouble you have been to get these horrid things away from him? Oh, I shall go mad!”

“But that was different,” Miss Grantham said impatiently. “I never thought he would give them to me merely for the asking!”

“But, my love; you were trying to take them from him by force!” wailed her ladyship.

“Yes, and so I would have,” agreed Miss Grantham. “But to be beholden to him in this manner is intolerable!”

“Deb, they are my bills, and I don’t find it intolerable!” said her ladyship in imploring tones.

“It puts me in the most odious position! I can never lift my head again! Besides, he does not even like me! You must see, ma’am, that I cannot endure this! It is not as though I had behaved nicely to him: I have done everything I could to make him hate and despise me!”

“Yes, my love, indeed you have, and that is what makes it so particularly obliging of him! I daresay he must think you are mad, and that is why he has done it, because, he is sorry for you.”

This suggestion found no favour at all with Miss Grantham. She fired up at once, saying: “He must know very well that I am nothing of the kind! I don’t want him to be sorry for me. There is no reason why he should be!”

“Well, my love, perhaps he is sorry for me, and I am sure there is plenty of reason for that!”

Miss Grantham got up, kneading her hands together. “It must be paid!” she said.

“Paid?” gasped her aunt. “I can never pay the half of such sum.”

“Yes, yes, we always meant to pay the mortgage, my dear ma’am! It must be done!”

“I call it flying in the face of providence!” said Lady Bellingham, with strong feeling. “With all these other horrid bills of wine, and carriages, and green peas, and candles! I declare Deb, you are enough to try the patience of a saint!”