"Alice? Not Blanche?"

"The story runs that he has played Blanche very false. That he has
been with her much during the last three or four months, leading on her
expectations; and then suddenly proposed for her younger sister. I know
nothing of the details myself; it is not likely; and I heard nothing,
until one evening at the club I saw the announcement of the marriage for
the following day at St. George's. I was at the church the next morning
before he was."

"Not to stop it; not to intercept the marriage!" breathlessly uttered
the Lady Isabel.

"Certainly not. I had no power to attempt anything of the sort. I went
to demand an answer to my question--what he had done with you, and where
you were. He gave me this address, but said he knew nothing of your
movements since December."

There was a long silence. The earl appeared to be alternately ruminating
and taking a survey of the room. Isabel sat with her head down.

"Why did you seek me out?" she presently broke forth. "I am not worth
it. I have brought enough disgrace upon your name."

"And upon your husband's and upon your children's," he rejoined, in the
most severe manner, for it was not in the nature of the Earl of Mount
Severn to gloss over guilt. "Nevertheless it is incumbent upon me, as
your nearest blood relative, to see after you, now that you are alone
again, and to take care, as far as I can, that you do not lapse lower."

He might have spared her that stab. But she scarcely understood him. She
looked at him, wondering whether she did understand.

"You have not a shilling in the world," he resumed. "How do you propose
to live?"

"I have some money yet. When--"

"_His_ money?" sharply and haughtily interposed the earl.

"No," she indignantly replied. "I am selling my trinkets. Before they
are all gone, I shall look out to get a living in some way; by teaching,
probably."

"Trinkets!" repeated Lord Mount Severn. "Mr. Carlyle told me that you
carried nothing away with you from East Lynne."

"Nothing that he had given me. These were mine before I married. You
have seen Mr. Carlyle, then?" she faltered.

"Seen him?" echoed the indignant earl. "When such a blow was dealt him
by a member of my family, could I do less than hasten to East Lynne to
tender my sympathies? I went with another subject too--to discover what
could have been the moving springs of your conduct; for I protest, when
the black tidings reached me, I believed that you must have