“Oh, no!” she exclaimed. “Indeed, sir, you mustn’t! Pray—!”

“No, no, take it, my dear! You will oblige me very much by taking it! I never had a daughter, you know, but if I had I should have wished for one like you, with your sweet face, and your pretty ways!”

She was very much touched, and regardless alike of the passers-by and Edward’s speechless anger stood on tiptoe to kiss Sir Lambert’s cheek, one hand on his broad shoulder. “And I wish very much that you had been my father, sir,” she said. “I should have loved you much more than ever I loved my own, for you are a great deal kinder! Thank you! indeed I will take it, and remember you whenever I wear it, I promise you!”

He returned her embrace, putting his arm round her, and giving her a hug. “That’s a good gal!” he said. He then dug Edward in the ribs with the head of his cane, and said, with a slight lapse from his parental mood: “Well, you young dog, you may take her now, but if I were ten years younger damme if I wouldn’t cut you out!”

After that he executed another of his practised bows, settled the beaver on his head again, and sauntered off down the street, keeping a weather eye cocked for any personable female who might come within his orbit.

“You know, he may be a sad rip, but he’s the dearest creature!” Venetia said, forgetting that Edward’s mood was scarcely in harmony with hers.

“I can only suppose you to have taken leave of your senses!” he said.

She had been watching, with a little smile of appreciative amusement, Sir Lambert’s progress down the street, but she turned her head at this, and said with considerable asperity: “I certainly supposed you to have taken leave of yours! What can have possessed you to behave with such a want of conduct? I was never more mortified!”

“You were never more mortified!” he said. “I do not know how you can stand there, Venetia, speaking in such a manner!”

“I don’t mean to stand here speaking in any manner at all,” she interrupted, stepping off the flagway in the wake of the urchin who was zealously sweeping the crossing for her. “Stop looking as sulky as a bear, and give that boy a penny!”

He caught up with her as she reached the opposite side of Oxford Street. “How came you to be in that old court-card’s company?” he demanded roughly.

“Pray remember that you are speaking of my father-in-law!” she replied coldly. “I have been visiting my mother, and he was so obliging as to escort me home.”

“Visiting your mother?” he repeated, as though unable to believe his ears.

“Certainly. Pray, have you any objection?”

He replied in a resolutely controlled voice: “I have every objection, and you shall presently learn what they are! I do not choose to bandy words with you in public! We will be silent, if you please!”

She returned no answer, but walked on, her countenance untroubled. He kept step beside her, his brow frowning, and his mouth grimly set. She made no attempt to speak to him until they stood on the steps of her uncle’s house, when, glancing thoughtfully at him, she said: “You may come in with me, if you wish, but don’t show the porter that face, if you please! You have advertized your displeasure to enough people already.”

As she spoke, the door was opened, and she stepped into the house It was the under-butler who had admitted her, and she paused to ask him if his mistress was in. On learning that Mrs. Hendred, having suffered a disturbed night, had not yet left her bedchamber, she took Edward up to the drawing-room, and said, as she began to strip off her gloves: “Now say what you will, but try to recollect, Edward, that I am my own mistress! You appear to believe that you have authority over me, but you have not, and so I have told you very many times!”

He stood looking at her gloomily, and at length replied: “I have been mistaken in your character. I allowed myself to believe that the levity of which I have frequently had cause to complain sprang from a natural liveliness rather than from any want of disposition in you. My eyes have been opened indeed!”

“I am extremely glad to hear it, for it was certainly time they should be. Don’t accuse me, however, of deceiving you! You deceived yourself, for you would never believe that I mean the things I say. The truth is, Edward, that we are poles apart. I have a great respect for you—”

“I wish I might say the same of you!”

“How very uncivil of you! Come, let us shake hands, and say no more, except to wish each other happy!”

He made no movement to take the hand stretched out to him, but said heavily: “My mother was right!”

Her ready sense of the ridiculous overcame her annoyance; her eyes began to dance; she said cordially: “To be sure, she was!”

“She begged me not to allow my judgment to be overborne by my infatuation. I wish that I had heeded her. I might then have been spared the mortification of discovering that the female whom I had intended to make my wife had neither heart nor delicacy!”

“Well, I wish you had, too, but all’s well that ends well, you know! In future you will do as your mother bids you, and I expect she will find the very wife to make you comfortable, I’m sure I hope she will.”

“I should have known what to expect when you did not scruple, in spite of my representations, to visit the Priory daily. You appear to have a preference for libertines!”

The smile swept over her face, transfiguring it. “It’s very true, Edward: I have indeed! Now I think you had better go. You have rung a fine peal over me, and it is time I went up to see how my aunt does.”

“I shall leave London by the first coach tomorrow morning!” he announced, and on this valedictory line stalked from the room.

Hardly had his step died away on the stair than the door opened again, this time to admit Mrs. Hendred, who came in looking very much startled, and instantly exclaimed: “My love, what has happened, to send Mr. Yardley off in such a pucker? I was coming downstairs when he rushed out of this room with such a countenance that I declare I was quite alarmed! I spoke to him, as you may suppose, asking if anything was amiss, but he wouldn’t stop—said only that you would tell me, and was gone before I could fetch my breath! Oh, Venetia, don’t tell me you have quarrelled?”

“Well, I won’t tell you, if you had rather I didn’t, dear aunt, but it is the truth, for all that!” replied Venetia, laughing. “Oh, dear, what a goose he did make of himself! I could almost forgive him for it! I’m afraid you will be quite as shocked as he was, ma’am: I have been to call on Mama, and Edward met me in New Bond Street, coming home on Sir Lambert’s arm!”

She was obliged to repeat this confession before Mrs. Hendred could at all take it in, and then to support the poor lady to her favourite chair. This second disaster, following on the shock of the previous evening’s encounter, proved too much for Mrs. Hendred’s shattered nerves: she burst into tears, and between her painful sobs delivered herself of a disjointed monologue which was at once a jeremiad and a diatribe. Venetia made no attempt to defend herself against the various charges levelled at her, but devoted herself to the task of soothing and petting her afflicted relative into comparative calm. Exhausted by her emotions, Mrs. Hendred at last lay back in her chair with her eyes shut, merely moaning faintly, and feebly repulsing her ungrateful niece. Venetia looked doubtfully at her, decided against making any further announcement, and went away to summon Miss Bradpole.

Consigning Mrs. Hendred to her competent care, she once more left the house, and made her way to the hackney stand. “To Lombard Street, if you please!” she told the jarvey. “The General Post Office!”

The afternoon was considerably advanced when she again returned to Cavendish Square. She learned from Miss Bradpole that Mrs. Hendred had retired to bed, but had declined all offers to summon the doctor to her side. She had been coaxed to toy with a light nuncheon—just a cup of broth, a morsel of chicken, and some ratafia cream—and now seemed a trifle easier, and inclined to sleep. Venetia, showing a proper concern, favoured Miss Bradpole with a glib explanation of her aunt’s collapse, and went away to her own room.

It was not until much later that she ventured to tap gently on Mrs. Hendred’s door. A failing voice bade her come in, and she entered to find her aunt reclining against a mountain of pillows, a very pretty nightcap tied under her chin, her handkerchief in one hand, her vinaigrette in the other, and on the table beside the bed a battery of sedatives and restoratives. Upon hearing Venetia’s voice, she turned reproachful eyes towards the door, and uttered a heart-rending sigh. Then she perceived that Venetia was wearing a travelling dress under a thick pelisse, and her demeanour underwent an abrupt change. She sat up with a jerk, and demanded in far from moribund accents: “Why are you dressed like that? Where are you going?”

Venetia came to the bedside, and bent over her aunt, kissing her cheek affectionately: “Dearest aunt, I’m going home!”

“No, no!” cried Mrs. Hendred, clutching her sleeve. “Oh, dear, I shall become perfectly distracted! I didn’t mean it! Heaven knows what’s to be done, but your uncle will think of something, depend upon it! Venetia, if I said anything—”

“Of course you didn’t, ma’am!” Venetia said, smiling at her, and patting her shoulder caressingly. “But you cannot hope to re-establish my credit, and I would so much rather you didn’t make the attempt. You have been too kind to me already, and I’m a wretch to make you so uncomfortable. But, you see, it’s my whole life I’m fighting for, and I can’t be sure that even now it’s not too late! Pray try to forgive me, my dear aunt, and—and understand a little!”