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There was silence in the book-rooht with tension My lady’s blue eyes, staring across the desk into ray ones, dropped to the pile of bills under his hand Her fair head was hung, and her nervous hands clasped one another tightly In spite of a -dress of twilled French silk, and the solden curls by the most fashionable coiffeur in London, she looked absurdly youthful, like a schoolgirl caught out in mischief She was, in fact, not yet nineteen years old, and she had beenon the other side of the desk, and so steadily regarding her

‘Well?’

She sed rather convulsively The Earl had spoken quite gently, but her ears were quick to catch the note of implacability in his voice She stole a scared look up at hi, but there was no doubt that he meant to obtain an answer to the quite unanswerable question he had put to his erring bride

Another silence fell, broken only by the ticking of the large clock on the ether that they whitened

‘I asked you, Nell, why all these tradesain – ‘have found it necessary to apply to me for the settlement of their accounts?’

‘I am very sorry!’ faltered the Countess

‘But that doesn’t answer my question,’ he said dryly

‘Well – well, I expect it was because I – because I forgot to pay them myself!’

‘Forgot?’

Lower sank her golden head; she sed again

‘Under the hatches yet again, Nell?’

She nodded guiltily, her colour deepening

His expression was inscrutable, and for a aze see in his head it would have been iuessed ‘I appear to make you a very inadequate allowance,’ he observed

The knowledge that the allowance he made her was a very handsolance up at him and to stammer: ‘Oh, no, no!’

‘Then why are you in debt?’

‘I have bought things which perhaps I should not,’ she said desperately ‘This – this gown, for instance! Indeed, I am sorry I won’t do so any more!’

‘May I see your paid bills?’

This was said ently still, but it effectively drove the flush from her cheeks They became as white as they had before been red To be sure, she had any number of receipted bills, but none knew better than she that their total, staggering though it hter of an impoverished peer, did not account for half of that handsome allowance which was paid quarterly to her bankers At any moment now my lord would ask the question she dreaded, and dared not answer truthfully

It cao, Nell,’ said the Earl, in a measured tone, ‘I forbade you ave me your word that you would not Have you done so?’

She shook her head It was dreadful to lie to him, but what else was to be done when he looked so stern, and had shown himself so unsy difficulties were all due to his shocking luck; and it seemed that Cardross couldn’t understand how unjust it was to bla That Fatal Tendency, said Manation, ran in the family: Grandpapa had died under a cloud of debt; and Papa, with the hopeful intention of restoring the fortunes of his house, had still ed his estates That hy Papa had been so overjoyed when Cardross had offered for her hand For Cardross was as well-born as he ealthy, and Papa had previously been obliged to face the horrid necessity of giving his eldest daughter to the highest bidder, even (dreadful thought!) if this should prove to be a rich reat fortitude, and he had had his reward: in her very first season – indeed, before she had been out a month – Cardross had not only seen the Lady Helen Irvine, but had apparently decided that she was the bride for whoood fortune had never even occurred to Lord Pevensey It was certainly to be supposed that Cardross, past thirty, and with no nearer relation than a cousin to succeed hie in the not too distant future, but such was his consequence that he ht have had the pick of all the damsels faithfully presented by their -rooms, and thereafter exhibited by them at Almack’s Assee by the style of the lady as pretty generally known to be hisolder and by far more sophisticated than a child fresh froht to see his little Nell do so well for the faenerosity proved to be rather too much for him: hardly had he led his child to the altar than he suffered a stroke The doctors assured his lady that he had many years of life before him, but the visitation had rendered him so far incapable that he had had to abandon his usual pursuits, and to retire to the seclusion of his ancestral home in Devonshire, where, it was the earnest if unexpressed hope of his wife and son-in-law, he would be obliged to remain

Nell did not know just what Cardross had done to earn her parents’ gratitude It all caue title of Settlements, and s

he was not to bother her pretty head over it, but to take care always to conduct herself with dignity and discretion Ma herself to be deeply thankful, had made quite plain to her what her duty henceforould be It included such things as always showinghi to be aware of it if (perhaps) he was found to have formed a Connection outside the walls of that splendid house of his in Grosvenor Square ‘One thing I a Nell’s hand, ‘and that is that he will treat you with the greatest consideration! His ood that I am persuaded you will never have cause to colect, or – or indifferent civility, which is the lot of so many females in your situation I assure you,than to be married to a aged’