f life
and not desiring to occupy any position of brilliancy. She thought
assuredly of her hoard of animosity toward the scandalmongers, and of
the quiet glance she would cast behind on them, and below. That thought
came as a fruit, not as a reflection.

But if ever two offending young gentlemen, nephews of a long-suffering
uncle, were circumvented, undermined, and struck to earth, with one
blow, here was the instance. This was accomplished by Lord Romfrey's
resolution to make the lady he had learnt to esteem his countess: and
more, it fixed to him for life one whom he could not bear to think of
losing: and still more, it might be; but what more was unwritten on his
tablets.

Rosamund failed to recollect that Everard Romfrey never took a step
without seeing a combination of objects to be gained by it.

CHAPTER XLIV. THE NEPHEWS OF THE EARL, AND ANOTHER EXHIBITION OF THE TWO
PASSIONS IN BEAUCHAMP

It was now the season when London is as a lighted tower to her
provinces, and, among other gentlemen hurried thither by attraction,
Captain Baskelett arrived. Although not a personage in the House of
Commons, he was a vote; and if he never committed himself to the perils
of a speech, he made himself heard. His was the part of chorus, which he
performed with a fairly close imitation of the original cries of periods
before parliaments were instituted, thus representing a stage in the
human development besides the borough of Bevisham. He arrived in the
best of moods for the emission of high-pitched vowel-sounds; otherwise
in the worst of tempers. His uncle had notified an addition of his
income to him at Romfrey, together with commands that he should quit
the castle instantly: and there did that woman, Mistress Culling, do the
honours to Nevil Beauchamp's French party. He assured Lord Palmet of
his positive knowledge of the fact, incredible as the sanction of such
immoral proceedings by the Earl of Romfrey must appear to that young
nobleman. Additions to income are of course acceptable, but in the form
of a palpable stipulation for silence, they neither awaken gratitude nor
effect their purpose. Quite the contrary; they prick the moral mind to
sit in judgement on the donor. It means, she fears me! Cecil confidently
thought and said of the intriguing woman who managed his patron.

The town-house was open to him. Lord Romfrey was at Steynham. Cecil
could not suppose that he was falling into a pit in entering it. He
happe