.

Sir Charles then, with the utmost kindness, endeavored to reconcile the
weeping and disheveled fair to that separation which circumstances
rendered necessary. But she was inconsolable, and he left the house,
perplexed and grieved; not but what it gratified his vanity a little to
find himself beloved all in a moment, and the Somerset unvixened. He
could not help thinking how wide must be the circle of his charms,
which had won the affections of two beautiful women so opposite in
character as Bella Bruce and La Somerset.

The passion of this latter seemed to grow. She wrote to him every day,
and begged him to call on her.

She called on him--she who had never called on a man before.

She raged with jealousy; she melted with grief. She played on him with
all a woman's artillery; and at last actually wrung from him what she
called a reprieve.

Richard Bassett called on her, but she would not receive him; so then
he wrote to her, urging co-operation, and she replied, frankly, that
she took no interest in his affairs; but that she was devoted to Sir
Charles, and should keep him for herself. Vanity tempted her to add
that he (Sir Charles) was with her every day, and the wedding
postponed.

This last seemed too good to be true, so Richard Bassett set his
servant to talk to the servants in Portman Square. He learned that the
wedding was now to be on the 15th of June, instead of the 31st of May.

Convinced that this postponement was only a blind, and that the
marriage would never be, he breathed more freely at the news.

But the fact is, although Sir Charles had yielded so far to dread of
scandal, he was ashamed of himself, and his shame became remorse when
he detected a furtive tear in the dove-like eyes of her he really loved
and esteemed.

He went and told his trouble to Mr. Oldfield. "I am afraid she will do
something desperate," he said.

Mr. Oldfield heard him out, and then asked him had he told Miss
Somerset what he was going to settle on her.

"Not I. She is not in a condition to be influenced by that, at
present."

"Let me try her. The draft is ready. I'll call on her to-morrow." He
did call, and was told she did not know him.

"You tell her I am a lawyer, and it is very much to her interest to see
me," said Mr. Oldfield to the page.

He was admitted, but not to a _tete-a-tete._ Polly was kept in the
room. The Somerset had peeped, and Oldfield was an old fellow, with
white hair; if he had been a you