“Oh, lord, no! Not then!”said his lordship. “You were well-enough, but you couldn’t have expected him to look at you when the Lincombe chit was alive.”

“No. He didn’t look at me,” she agreed.

“Well, well!” the Earl said tolerantly. “She had ’em all beaten to flinders. By all accounts, he never cast so much as a glance at any other girl. And I’ve made up my mind to it that that’s why he’s offered for you.” He saw that she was looking bewildered, and said with some impatience: “Now, don’t be a pea-goose, girl! It’s as plain as a pikestaff that what Ludlow wants is a quiet, well-bred female who won’t have her head stuffed with romantic nonsense, or expect him to be thrown into a transport of passion. The more I think of it, the more it seems to me that he’s acting like a man of sense. If he’s still hankering after Clarissa Lincombe, it wouldn’t suit him at all to offer for some out-and-outer who would expect him to be dangling after her for ever, carried away by the violence of his feelings, or some such flummery. At the same time, it’s his duty to marry, and you may depend upon it he made up his mind to that when that brother of his got himself killed in Spain. Well, I don’t scruple to tell you that I never thought to see such a piece of good fortune befall you, Hester! To think that you should make a better match than any of your sisters, and at your age, too! It is beyond anything great!”

“Beyond anything—oh, beyond anything!”she said, in a queer voice. “And he is coming here, with your consent! Could you not have asked me first what my sentiments were? I do not wish for this splendid match, Papa.”

He looked as though he could hardly credit his ears. “Don’t wish for it?” he repeated, in a stupefied tone. “You must be out of your senses!”

“Perhaps I am.” The ghostly smile that was at once nervous and mischievous again flitted across her face. “You should have warned Sir Gareth of it, sir. I am persuaded he cannot wish to marry an idiot.”