step, which, however, she was
heroine enough not to retract or to repent, even while she recoiled from
its contemplation.

Lady Doltimore, amazed at what had passed,--at the flight of Maltravers,
the success of Lumley,--unable to account for it, to extort explanation
from Vargrave or from Evelyn, was distracted by the fear of some
villanous deceit which she could not fathom. To escape herself she
plunged yet more eagerly into the gay vortex. Vargrave, suspicious, and
fearful of trusting to what she might say in her nervous and excited
temper if removed from his watchful eye, deemed himself compelled
to hover round her. His manner, his conduct, were most guarded; but
Caroline herself, jealous, irritated, unsettled, evinced at times a
right both to familiarity and anger, which drew upon her and himself the
sly vigilance of slander. Meanwhile Lord Doltimore, though too cold
and proud openly to notice what passed around him, seemed disturbed
and anxious. His manner to Vargrave was distant; he shunned all
_tete-a-tetes_ with his wife. Little, however, of this did Lumley heed.
A few weeks more, and all would be well and safe. Vargrave did not
publish his engagement with Evelyn: he sought carefully to conceal it
till the very day was near at hand; but it was whispered abroad; some
laughed, some believed. Evelyn herself was seen nowhere. De Montaigne
had, at first, been indignantly incredulous at the report that
Maltravers had broken off a connection he had so desired from a motive
so weak and unworthy as that of mere family pride. A letter from
Maltravers, who confided to him and Vargrave alone the secret of his
retreat, reluctantly convinced him that the wise are but pompous fools;
he was angry and disgusted; and still more so when Valerie and Teresa
(for female friends stand by us right or wrong) hinted at excuses,
or surmised that other causes lurked behind the one alleged. But his
thoughts were much drawn from this subject by increasing anxiety for
Cesarini, whose abode and fate still remained an alarming mystery.

It so happened that Lord Doltimore, who had always had a taste for the
antique, and who was greatly displeased with his own family-seat
because it was comfortable and modern, fell, from _ennui_, into a
habit, fashionable enough in Paris, of buying curiosities and
cabinets,--high-back chairs and oak-carvings; and with this habit
returned the desire and the affection for Burleigh. Understanding from
Lumley that