e forward from her chair. The old woman was not
tall;--but her face was long, and at the same time large, square
at the chin and square at the forehead, and gave her almost an
appearance of height. Her nose was very prominent, not beaked, but
straight and strong, and broad at the bridge, and of a dark-red
colour. Her eyes were sharp and grey. Her mouth was large, and over
it there was almost beard enough for a young man's moustache. Her
chin was firm, and large, and solid. Her hair was still brown, and
was only just grizzled in parts. Nothing becomes an old woman like
grey hair, but Lady Linlithgow's hair would never be grey. Her
appearance on the whole was not pre-possessing, but it gave one
an idea of honest, real strength. What one saw was not buckram,
whalebone, paint, and false hair. It was all human,--hardly
feminine, certainly not angelic, with perhaps a hint in the other
direction,--but a human body, and not a thing of pads and patches.
Lizzie, as she saw her aunt, made up her mind for the combat. Who is
there that has lived to be a man or woman, and has not experienced
a moment in which a combat has impended, and a call for such sudden
courage has been necessary? Alas!--sometimes the combat comes, and
the courage is not there. Lady Eustace was not at her ease as she saw
her aunt enter the room. "Oh, come ye in peace, or come ye in war?"
she would have said had she dared. Her aunt had sent up her love,--if
the message had been delivered aright; but what of love could there
be between the two? The countess dashed at once to the matter in
hand, making no allusion to Lizzie's ungrateful conduct to herself.
"Lizzie," she said, "I've been asked to come to you by Mr.
Camperdown. I'll sit down, if you please."

"Oh, certainly, Aunt Penelope. Mr. Camperdown!"

"Yes;--Mr. Camperdown. You know who he is. He has been with me
because I am your nearest relation. So I am, and therefore I have
come. I don't like it, I can tell you."

"As for that, Aunt Penelope, you've done it to please yourself," said
Lizzie, in a tone of insolence with which Lady Linlithgow had been
familiar in former days.

"No, I haven't, miss. I haven't come for my own pleasure at all.
I have come for the credit of the family, if any good can be done
towards saving it. You've got your husband's diamonds locked up
somewhere, and you must give them back."

"My husband's diamonds were my diamonds," said Lizzie stoutly.

"They are family diamonds, Eus