have much of a welcome at Steignton! If I were a woman to wager as men
do, I 'd stake a thousand pounds to five on her never stepping across
the threshold of Steignton. All very well in London, and that place he
hires up at Marlow. He respects our home. That 's how I know my brother
Rowsley still keeps a sane man. A fortune on it!--and so says Mr.
Eglett. Any reasonable person must think it. He made a fool of some
Hampton-Evey at Madrid, if he went through any ceremony--and that I
doubt. But she and old (what do they call her?) may have insisted upon
the title, as much as they could. He sixty; she under twenty, I'm told.
Pagnell 's the name. That aunt of a good-looking young woman sees a
noble man of sixty admiring her five feet seven or so--she's tall--of
marketable merchandise, and she doesn't need telling that at sixty he'll
give the world to possess the girl. But not his family honour! He stops
at that. Why? Lord Ormont 's made of pride! He'll be kind to her, he'll
be generous, he won't forsake her; she'll have her portion in his will,
and by the course of things in nature, she'll outlive him and marry, and
be happy, I hope. Only she won't enter Steignton. You remember what I
say. You 'll live when I 'm gone. It 's the thirst of her life to be
mistress of Steignton. Not she!--though Lord Ormont would have us all
open our doors to her; mine too, now he 's about it. He sets his mind on
his plan, and he forgets rights and dues--everything; he must have it as
his will dictates. That 's how he made such a capital soldier. You know
the cavalry leader he was. If they'd given him a field in Europe! His
enemies admit that. Twelve! and my clock's five minutes or more slow.
What can Rowsley be doing?'

She rattled backward on the scene at Steignton, and her brother's
handsome preservation of his dignity 'stood it like the king he is!' and
to the Morsfield-May encounter, which had prevented another; and Mrs.
May was rolled along in the tide, with a hint of her good reason for
liking Lord Ormont; also the change of opinion shown by the Press as to
Lord Ormont's grand exploit. Referring to it, she flushed and jigged on
her chair for a saddle beneath her. And that glorious Indian adventure
warmed her to the man who had celebrated it among his comrades when a
boy at school.

'You 're to teach Latin and Greek, you said. For you 're right: we
English can't understand the words we 're speaking, if we don't know a
good deal of Latin a