."

"You can say nothing hard of her. She is perfect."

"We will let that pass, though it is hardly kind of you, just at the
present moment. Let her be perfect. Can you marry this perfection
without a sixpence,--you that are in debt, and who never could save a
sixpence in your life? Would it be for her good,--or for yours? You
have done a foolish thing, sir, and you know that you must get out of
it."

"I know nothing of the kind."

"You cannot marry Lucy Morris. That is the truth. My present need
makes me bold. Frank, shall I be your wife? Such a marriage will not
be without love, at any rate on one side,--though there be utter
indifference on the other!"

"You know I am not indifferent to you," said he, with wicked
weakness.

"Now, at any rate," she continued, "you must understand what must
be my answer to Lord Fawn. It is you that must answer Lord Fawn. If
my heart is to be broken, I may as well break it under his roof as
another."

"I have no roof to offer you," he said.

"But I have one for you," she said, throwing her arm round his neck.
He bore her embrace for a minute, returning it with the pressure of
his arm; and then, escaping from it, seized his hat and left her
standing in the room.

CHAPTER LXIII

The Corsair Is Afraid

On the following morning,--Monday morning,--there appeared in one
of the daily newspapers the paragraph of which Lady Linlithgow had
spoken to Lucy Morris. "We are given to understand,"--newspapers are
very frequently given to understand,--"that a man well-known to the
London police as an accomplished housebreaker has been arrested in
reference to the robbery which was effected on the 30th of January
last at Lady Eustace's house in Hertford Street. No doubt the same
person was concerned in the robbery of her ladyship's jewels at
Carlisle on the night of the 8th of January. The mystery which has so
long enveloped these two affairs, and which has been so discreditable
to the metropolitan police, will now probably be cleared up." There
was not a word about Patience Crabstick in this; and, as Lizzie
observed, the news brought by the policeman on Saturday night
referred only to Patience, and said nothing of the arrest of any
burglar. The ladies in Hertford Street scanned the sentence with the
greatest care, and Mrs. Carbuncle was very angry because the house
was said to be Lizzie's house. "It wasn't my doing," said Lizzie.

"The policeman came to you about it."

"I did