oots not to inquire now."

"It does not," warmly replied Lionel. "You have done well. Let us bury
Mrs. Roy's story between us, and forget it, so far as we can."

They parted. Lionel took his way to Deerham Court, absorbed in thought.
His own strong impression had been, that Mr. Fred Massingbird was the
black sheep with regard to Rachel.

CHAPTER XLIII.

LIONEL'S PRAYER FOR FORGIVENESS.

Lady Verner, like many more of us, found that misfortunes do not come
singly. Coeval almost with that great misfortune, Lionel's marriage--at
any rate, coeval with his return to Verner's Pride with his
bride--another vexation befell Lady Verner. Had Lady Verner found real
misfortunes to contend with, it is hard to say how she would have borne
them. Perhaps Lionel's marriage to Sibylla was a real misfortune; but
this second vexation assuredly was not--at any rate to Lady Verner.

Some women--and Lady Verner was one--are fond of scheming and planning.
Whether it be the laying out of a flower-bed, or the laying out of a
marriage, they must plan and project. Disappointment with regard to her
own daughter--for Decima most unqualifyingly disclaimed any match-making
on her own score--Lady Verner had turned her hopes in this respect on
Lucy Tempest. She deemed that she should be ill-fulfilling the
responsibilities of her guardianship, unless when Colonel Tempest
returned to England, she could present Lucy to him a wife, or, at least,
engaged to be one. Many a time now did she unavailingly wish that Lionel
had chosen Lucy, instead of her whom he had chosen. Although--and mark
how we estimate things by comparison--when, in the old days, Lady Verner
had fancied Lionel was growing to like Lucy, she had told him
emphatically it "would not do." Why would it not do? Because, in the
estimation of Lady Verner, Lucy Tempest was less desirable in a social
point of view than the Earl of Elmsley's daughter, and upon the latter
lady had been fixed her hopes for Lionel.

All that was past and gone. Lady Verner had seen the fallacy of
sublunary hopes and projects. Lady Mary Elmsley was rejected--Lionel had
married in direct defiance of everybody's advice--and Lucy was open to
offers. Open to offers, as Lady Verner supposed; but she was destined to
find herself unpleasantly disappointed.

One came forward with an offer to her. And that was no other than the
Earl of Elmsley's son, Viscount Garle. A pleasant man, of
eight-and-twenty years; and he