of the Golden Keys, in that town. An impressive woman, whom many would
turn to look at again in passing; her figure was slim and sufficiently
tall, her face rather emaciated, so that its sculpturesque beauty was
the more pronounced, her crisp hair perfectly black, and her large,
anxious eyes what we call black. Her dress was soberly correct, her
age, perhaps, physically more advanced than the number of years would
imply, but hardly less than seven-and-thirty. An uneasy-looking woman:
her glance seemed to presuppose that the people and things were going
to be unfavorable to her, while she was, nevertheless, ready to meet
them with resolution. The children were lovely--a dark-haired girl of
six or more, a fairer boy of five. When Lush incautiously expressed
some surprise at her having brought the children, she said, with a
sharp-toned intonation--

"Did you suppose I should come wandering about here by myself? Why
should I not bring all four if I liked?"

"Oh, certainly," said Lush, with his usual fluent _nonchalance_.

He stayed an hour or so in conference with her, and rode back to Diplow
in a state of mind that was at once hopeful and busily anxious as to
the execution of the little plan on which his hopefulness was based.
Grandcourt's marriage to Gwendolen Harleth would not, he believed, be
much of a good to either of them, and it would plainly be fraught with
disagreeables to himself. But now he felt confident enough to say
inwardly, "I will take, nay, I will lay odds that the marriage will
never happen."

CHAPTER XIV.

I will not clothe myself in wreck--wear gems
Sawed from cramped finger-bones of women drowned;
Feel chilly vaporous hands of ireful ghosts
Clutching my necklace: trick my maiden breast
With orphans' heritage. Let your dead love
Marry it's dead.

Gwendolen looked lovely and vigorous as a tall, newly-opened lily the
next morning: there was a reaction of young energy in her, and
yesterday's self-distrust seemed no more than the transient shiver on
the surface of a full stream. The roving archery match in Cardell Chase
was a delightful prospect for the sport's sake: she felt herself
beforehand moving about like a wood-nymph under the beeches (in
appreciative company), and the imagined scene lent a charm to further
advances on the part of Grandcourt--not an impassioned lyrical Daphnis
for the wood-nymph, certainly: but so much the better. To-day Gwendolen
foresaw him making slo