in
a bride, and a rich bride, too. It behoved him to be careful of his outer
man on such an occasion.

He had heard of Mr. Harlowe's death and of his grand-daughter's good
fortune when he was at Constantinople, for he had friends in London who
kept him _au courant_ with the gossip of society, and he had straightway
made his preparations to return to England. He had not hurried himself,
however, for what he had not heard of was that clause in the old man's
will which made his grand-daughter's marriage within two months the _sine
qua non_ of her inheriting his fortune. Such an idea as that had never
come into Monsieur D'Arblet's head; he had no conception but that he
should be in plenty of time.

When he got to the house in Princes Gate he found it shut up. This,
however, did not disconcert him, it was no more than he expected. After
a considerable amount of ringing at both bells, there was a grating sound
within as of the unfastening of bolts and chains, and an elderly woman,
evidently fresh from her labours over the scouring of the kitchen grate,
appeared at the door, opening it just a couple of inches, as though she
dreaded the invasion of a gang of housebreakers.

"Will you please tell me where Mrs. Romer is now living?"

The woman grinned. "She has been living at Walpole Lodge, at Kew--Lady
Kynaston's, sir."

"Oh, thank you;" and he was preparing to re-enter his hansom.

"But I don't think you will see her to-day, sir."

"Why not?" turning half-round again.

"It is Mrs. Romer's wedding-day."

"_What?_"

That elderly female, who had been at one time a housemaid in Mr.
Harlowe's household, confided afterwards to her intimate friend, the
kitchenmaid next door, that she was so frightened at the way that
foreign-looking gentleman shouted at her, that she felt as if she should
have dropped. "Indeed, my dear, I was forced to go down and get a drop of
whisky the very instant he was gone, I felt so fluttered, like."

Monsieur Le Vicomte turned round to her, with his foot midway between the
pavement and the step of the hansom, and shouted at her again.

"_What_ did you say it was, woman?"

"Why, Mrs. Romer's wedding-day, to be sure, sir; and no such wonder after
all, I should say; and a lovely morning for the wedding it be, too."

Lucien D'Arblet put his hand vaguely up to his head, as though he had
received a blow; she had escaped him, then, after all.

"So soon after the old man's death," he murmured, half