his father on
horseback and in regimentals, waving his sword in front of the gallant
the Bengal Cavalry, which the lad had sent down to the good old woman?
He could not be very bad, Ethel thought, who was so kind and thoughtful
for the poor. His father's son could not be altogether a reprobate. When
Mrs. Mason, seeing how good and beautiful Ethel was, and thinking in her
heart nothing could be too good or beautiful for Clive, nodded her kind
old head at Miss Ethel, and said she should like to find a husband for
her, Miss Ethel blushed, and looked handsomer than ever; and at home,
when she was describing the interview, never mentioned this part of her
talk with Mrs. Mason.

But the enfant terrible, young Alfred, did: announcing to all the
company at dessert, that Ethel was in love with Clive--that Clive was
coming to marry her--that Mrs. Mason, the old woman at Newcome, had told
him so.

"I dare say she has told the tale all over Newcome!" shrieked out Mr.
Barnes. "I dare say it will be in the Independent next week. By Jove,
it's a pretty connexion--and nice acquaintances this uncle of ours
brings us!" A fine battle ensued upon the receipt and discussion of this
intelligence: Barnes was more than usually bitter and sarcastic: Ethel
haughtily recriminated, losing her temper, and then her firmness, until,
fairly bursting into tears, she taxed Barnes with meanness and malignity
in for ever uttering stories to his cousin's disadvantage, and pursuing
with constant slander and cruelty one of the very best of men. She rose
and left the table in great tribulation--she went to her room and wrote
a letter to her uncle, blistered with tears, in which she besought him
not to come to Newcome.--Perhaps she went and looked at the apartments
which she had adorned and prepared for his reception. It was for him and
for his company that she was eager. She had met no one so generous and
gentle, so honest and unselfish, until she had seen him.

Lady Anne knew the ways of women very well; and when Ethel that night,
still in great indignation and scorn against Barnes, announced that she
had written a letter to her uncle, begging the Colonel not to come at
Christmas, Ethel's mother soothed the wounded girl, and treated her with
peculiar gentleness and affection; and she wisely gave Mr. Barnes to
understand, that if he wished to bring about that very attachment, the
idea of which made him so angry, he could use no better means than those
whi