rs. Bassett drew her on one side, and soon soothed her.

When their gentle bosoms got over their agitation, they rather enjoyed
the thing, especially Ruperta: she detested Reginald for his character,
and for having insulted her father.

All of a sudden, she cried out, "He has taken my handkerchief. How dare
he?" And she affected anger.

"Never mind, dear," said Mrs. Bassett, coolly, "we have got his
tippet."

CHAPTER XLIII.

COULD any one have looked through the keyhole at Lady Bassett waiting
for Reginald, he would have seen, by the very movements of her body,
the terrible agitation of the mind. She rose--she sat down--she walked
about with wild energy--she dropped on the sofa, and appeared to give
it up as impossible; but ere long that deadly languor gave way to
impatient restlessness again.

At last her quick ear heard a footstep in the corridor, accompanied by
no rustle of petticoats, and yet the footstep was not Compton's.

Instantly she glanced with momentary terror toward the door.

There was a tap.

She sat down, and said, with a tone from which all agitation was
instantly banished, "Come in."

The door opened, and the swarthy Reginald, diabolically handsome, with
his black snaky curls, entered the room.

She rose from her chair, and fixed her great eyes on him, as if she
would read him soul and body before she ventured to speak.

"Here I am, mamma: sorry to see you look so ill."

"Thank you, my dear," said Lady Bassett, without relaxing for a moment
that searching gaze.

She said, still covering him with her eye, "Would you cure me if you
could?"

To appreciate this opening, and Lady Bassett's sweet engaging manner,
you must understand that this young man was, in her eyes, a sort of
black snake. Her flesh crept, with fear and repugnance, at the sight of
him. Yet that is how she received him, being a mother defending her
favorite son.

"Of course I would," said Reginald. "Just you tell me how."

Excellent words. But the lady's calm infallible eye saw a cunning
twinkle in those black twinkling orbs. Young as he was, he was on his
guard, and waiting for her. Nor was this surprising: Reginald,
naturally intelligent, had accumulated a large stock of low cunning in
his travels and adventures with the gypsies, a smooth and cunning
people. Lady Bassett's fainting upon his return, his exclusion from her
room, and one or two minor circumstances, had set him thinking.

The moment she saw that