Clavering would be somebody in his county--would be a husband
of whom his wife would be proud as he went about among his tenants and
his gamekeepers, and perhaps on wider and better journeys, looking up
the voters of his neighborhood. Yes, happy would be the wife of Sir
Harry Clavering. He was a man who would delight in sharing his house,
his hope; his schemes and councils with his wife. He would find a
companion in his wife. He would do honor to his wife, and make much of
her. He would like to see her go bravely. And then, if children came,
how tender he would be to them! Whether Harry could ever have become a
good head to a poor household might be doubtful, but no man had ever
been born fitter for the position which he was now called upon to fill.
It was thus that Lady Ongar thought of Harry Clavering as she owned to
herself that the full measure of her just retribution had come home to
her.

Of course she would go at once to Clavering Park. She wrote to her
sister saying so, and the next day she started. She started so quickly
on her journey that she reached the house not very many hours after her
own letter. She was there when the rector started for London, and there
when Mr. Fielding preached his sermon; but she did not see Mr. Clavering
before he went, nor was she present to hear the eloquence of the younger
clergyman. Till after that Sunday the only member of the family she had
seen was Mrs. Clavering, who spent some period of every day up at the
great house. Mrs. Clavering had not hitherto seen Lady Ongar since her
return, and was greatly astonished at the change which so short a time
had made. "She is handsomer than ever she was," Mrs. Clavering said to
the rector; "-but it is that beauty which some women carry into middle
life, and not the loveliness of youth." Lady Ongar's manner was cold and
stately when first she met Mrs. Clavering. It was on the morning of her
marriage when they had last met--when Julia Brabazon was resolving that
she would look like a countess, and that to be a countess should be
enough for her happiness. She could not but remember this now, and was
unwilling at first to make confession of her failure by any meekness of
conduct. It behooved her to be proud, at any rate till she should know
how this new Lady Clavering would receive her. And then it was more than
probable that this new Lady Clavering knew all that had taken place
between her and Harry. It behooved her, therefore, to hold her