ged to set his foot upon it, and the cross was broken
in two.

"There! Now whose fault was that?" cried Mrs. Levison.

Isabel did not answer; her heart was very full. She took the broken
cross, and the tears dropped from her eyes; she could not help it.

"Why! You are never crying over a stupid bauble of a cross!" uttered
Mrs. Vane, interrupting Captain Levison's expression of regret at his
awkwardness.

"You can have it mended, dear," interposed Mrs. Levison.

Lady Isabel chased away the tears, and turned to Captain Levison with
a cheerful look. "Pray do not blame yourself," she good-naturedly said;
"the fault was as much mine as yours; and, as Mrs. Levison says, I can
get it mended."

She disengaged the upper part of the cross from the chain as she spoke,
and clasped the latter round her throat.

"You will not go with that thin string of gold on, and nothing else!"
uttered Mrs. Vane.

"Why not?" returned Isabel. "If people say anything, I can tell them an
accident happened to the cross."

Mrs. Vane burst into a laugh of mocking ridicule. "'If people say
anything!'" she repeated, in a tone according with the laugh. "They
are not likely to 'say anything,' but they will deem Lord Mount Severn's
daughter unfortunately short of jewellery."

Isabel smiled and shook her head. "They saw my diamonds at the
drawing-room."

"If you had done such an awkward thing for me, Frank Levison," burst
forth the old lady, "my doors should have been closed against you for a
month. There, if you are to go, Emma, you had better go; dancing off to
begin an evening at ten o'clock at night! In my time we used to go at
seven; but it's the custom now to turn night into day."

"When George the Third dined at one o'clock upon boiled mutton
and turnips," put in the graceless captain, who certainly held his
grandmother in no greater reverence than did Mrs. Vane.

He turned to Isabel as he spoke, to hand her downstairs. Thus she was
conducted to her carriage the second time that night by a stranger.
Mrs. Vane got down by herself, as she best could, and her temper was not
improved by the process.

"Good-night," said she to the captain.

"I shall not say good-night. You will find me there almost as soon as
you."

"You told me you were not coming. Some bachelor's party in the way."

"Yes, but I have changed my mind. Farewell for the present, Lady
Isabel."

"What an object you will look, with nothing on your neck but a
schoolgirl's