d that he should walk up to the cottage,
call upon Colonel Askerton, and ask to see Clara in the Colonel's
presence. It was thought that he could make his statement about the
money better before a third person who could be regarded as Clara's
friend, than could possibly be done between themselves. He did,
therefore, walk across to the cottage, and was shown into Colonel
Askerton's study.

"There he is," Mrs. Askerton said, as soon as she heard the sound of
the bell. "I knew that he would come at once."

During the whole morning Mrs. Askerton had been insisting that Belton
would make his appearance on that very day,--the day of his arrival
at Belton, and Clara had been asserting that he would not do so.

"Why should he come?" Clara had said.

"Simply to take you to his own house, like any other of his goods and
chattels."

"I am not his goods or his chattels."

"But you soon will be; and why shouldn't you accept your lot quietly?
He is Belton of Belton, and everything here belongs to him."

"I do not belong to him."

"What nonsense! When a man has the command of the situation, as he
has, he can do just what he pleases. If he were to come and carry you
off by violence, I have no doubt the Beltonians would assist him, and
say that he was right. And you of course would forgive him. Belton of
Belton may do anything."

"That is nonsense, if you please."

"Indeed if you had any of that decent feeling of feminine inferiority
which ought to belong to all women, he would have found you sitting
on the door-step of his house waiting for him."

That had been said early in the morning, when they first knew that he
had arrived; but they had been talking about him ever since,--talking
about him under pressure from Mrs. Askerton, till Clara had been
driven to long that she might be spared. "If he chooses to come, he
will come," she said. "Of course he will come," Mrs. Askerton had
answered, and then they heard the ring of the bell. "There he is.
I could swear to the sound of his foot. Doesn't he step as though
he were Belton of Belton, and conscious that everything belonged
to him?" Then there was a pause. "He has been shown in to Colonel
Askerton. What on earth could he want with him?"

"He has called to tell him something about the cottage," said Clara,
endeavouring to speak as though she were calm through it all.

"Cottage! Fiddlestick! The idea of a man coming to look after his
trumpery cottage on the first day of h