xpression that plainly said, "Is this _your_ resolve?" He only moved
away, and did not speak.

"Not but if any of your own family," continued Lady Lackington, "could
come out here, and that you might prefer _their_ company,--that would be
an arrangement equally satisfactory. Is such an event likely?"

"Nothing less so, my Lady," said Lizzy. "My father has affairs of
urgency to treat at this moment."

"Oh, I did not exactly allude to your father,--you might have sisters."

"I have none."

"An aunt, perhaps?"

"I never heard of one."

"Lizzy, you are aware, Georgina," broke in Beecher, whose voice trembled
at every word, "was brought up abroad,--she never saw any of her
family."

"How strange! I might even say, how unfortunate!" sighed her Ladyship,
superciliously.

"Stranger, and more unfortunate still, your Ladyship would perhaps say,
if I were to tell you that I never so much as heard of them."

"I am not certainly prepared to say that the circumstance is one to be
boastful of," said Lady Lackington, who resented the look of haughty
defiance of the other.

"I assure your Ladyship that you are mistaken in attributing to me such
a sentiment. I have nothing of which to be boastful."

"Your present position, Lady Lackington, might inspire a very natural
degree of pride."

"It has not done so yet, my Lady. My experience of the elevated class
to which I have been raised has been too brief to impress me; a wider
knowledge will probably supply this void."

"And yet," said Lady Georgina, sarcastically, "it is something,--the
change from Miss Davis to the Viscountess Lackington."

"When that change becomes more real, more actual, my Lady," said Lizzy,
boldly, "it will, assuredly, bear its fruits; when, in being reminded of
what I was and whence I came, I can only detect the envious malevolence
that would taunt me with what is no fault of mine, but a mere accident
of fortune,--when I hear these things with calm composure, and in my
rank as a peeress feel the equal of those who would disparage me,--then,
indeed, I may be proud."

"Such a day may never come," said Lady Georgina, coldly.

"Very possibly, my Lady. It has cost me no effort to win this station
you seem to prize so highly; it will not exact one to forego all its
great advantages."

"What a young lady to be so old a philosopher! I 'm sure Lord Lackington
never so much as suspected the wisdom he acquired in his wife. It may,
however, be a family tr