Fawn. The tears were now streaming down Lucy's face, so that she was
hardly able to say a word in answer to all this kindness. And she did
not know what word to say. Were she to accept the offer made to her,
and acknowledge that she could do nothing better than creep back
under her old friend's wing,--would she not thereby be showing
that she doubted her lover? And yet she could not go to the dean's
house unless the dean and his wife were pleased to take her; and,
suspecting as she did, that they would not be pleased, would it
become her to throw upon her lover the burthen of finding for her
a home with people who did not want her? Had she been welcome at
Bobsborough, Mrs. Greystock would surely have so told her before
this. "You needn't say a word, my dear," said Lady Fawn. "You'll
come, and there's an end of it."

"But you don't want me any more," said Lucy, from amidst her sobs.

"That's just all that you know about it," said Lydia. "We do want
you,--more than anything."

"I wonder whether I may come in now," said Lady Linlithgow, entering
the room. As it was the countess's own drawing-room, as it was now
mid-winter, and as the fire in the dining-room had been allowed,
as was usual, to sink almost to two hot coals, the request was not
unreasonable. Lady Fawn was profuse in her thanks, and immediately
began to account for Lucy's tears, pleading their dear friendship and
their long absence, and poor Lucy's emotional state of mind. Then
she took her leave, and Lucy, as soon as she had been kissed by her
friends outside the drawing-room door, took herself to her bedroom,
and finished her tears in the cold.

"Have you heard the news?" said Lady Linlithgow to her companion
about a month after this. Lady Linlithgow had been out, and asked the
question immediately on her return. Lucy, of course, had heard no
news. "Lizzie Eustace has just come back to London, and has had all
her jewels stolen on the road."

"The diamonds?" asked Lucy, with amaze.

"Yes,--the Eustace diamonds! And they didn't belong to her any more
than they did to you. They've been taken, anyway; and from what I
hear I shouldn't be at all surprised if she had arranged the whole
matter herself."

"Arranged that they should be stolen?"

"Just that, my dear. It would be the very thing for Lizzie Eustace to
do. She's clever enough for anything."

"But, Lady Linlithgow--"

"I know all about that. Of course, it would be very wicked, and if
it were f