doubt but what she would send the affirmative
answer, if she were sure that these latter discoveries would not
alter Lord Fawn's decision. Lord Fawn had distinctly told her that,
if she pleased, he would marry her. She would please;--having been
much troubled by the circumstances of the past six months. But then,
was it not almost a certainty that Lord Fawn would retreat from his
offer on learning the facts which were now so well known as to have
been related in the public papers? She thought that she would take
one more night to think of it.

Alas! she took one night too many. On the next morning, while she was
still in bed, a letter was brought to her from Lord Fawn, dated from
his club the preceding evening. "Lord Fawn presents his compliments
to Lady Eustace. Lady Eustace will be kind enough to understand that
Lord Fawn recedes altogether from the proposition made by him in his
letter to Lady Eustace dated March 28th last. Should Lady Eustace
think proper to call in question the propriety of this decision on
the part of Lord Fawn, she had better refer the question to some
friend, and Lord Fawn will do the same. Lord Fawn thinks it best to
express his determination, under no circumstances, to communicate
again personally with Lady Eustace on this subject,--or, as far as he
can see at present, on any other."

The letter was a blow to her, although she had felt quite certain
that Lord Fawn would have no difficulty in escaping from her hands
as soon as the story of the diamonds should be made public. It was a
blow to her, although she had assured herself a dozen times that a
marriage with such a one as Lord Fawn, a man who had not a grain of
poetry in his composition, would make her unutterably wretched. What
escape would her heart have had from itself in such a union? This
question she had asked herself over and over again, and there had
been no answer to it. But then why had she not been beforehand with
Lord Fawn? Why had she not rejected his second offer with the scorn
which such an offer had deserved? Ah,--there was her misfortune;
there was her fault!

But, with Lizzie Eustace, when she could not do a thing which it
was desirable that she should be known to have done, the next
consideration was whether she could not so arrange as to seem to have
done it. The arrival of Lord Fawn's note just as she was about to
write to him, was unfortunate. But she would still write to him, and
date her letter before the time