on he
required." Jasper was too wary to call on the coachman; he had learned
enough for the present. Had he prosecuted his researches farther, he
might only have exposed himself to questions, and to the chance of his
inquiries being repeated to Lady Montfort by one of her servants, and
thus setting her on her guard; for no doubt his father had cautioned
her against him. It never occurred to him that the old man could already
have returned; and those to whom he confined his interrogatories were
quite ignorant of the fact. Jasper had no intention to intrude himself
that day on Lady Montfort. His self-love shrank from presenting himself
to a lady of such rank, and to whom he had been once presented on equal
terms, as the bridegroom of her friend and the confidential visitor to
her mother, in habiliments that bespoke so utter a fall. Better, too, on
all accounts, to appear something of a gentleman; more likely to excite
pity for suffering--less likely to suggest excuse for rebutting his
claims, and showing him to the door. Nay, indeed, so dressed, in that
villanous pea-jacket, and with all other habiliments to match, would any
servant admit him?--could he get into Lady Montfort's presence? He must
go back--wait for Mrs. Crane's return. Doubtless she would hail his
wish--half a reform in itself--to castoff the outward signs of an
accepted degradation.

Accordingly he went back to town in much better spirits, and so absorbed
in his hopes, that, when he arrived at Podden Place, he did not
observe that, from some obliquity of vision, or want of the normal
correspondence between will and muscle, his hand twice missed the
knocker-wandering first above, then below it; and that, when actually
in his clasp, he did not feel the solid iron: the sense of touch seemed
suspended. Bridgett appeared. "Mistress is come back, and will see you."

Jasper did not look charmed; he winced, but screwed up his courage, and
mounted the stairs--slowly-heavily. Form the landing-place above glared
down the dark shining eyes that had almost quailed his bold spirit
nearly six years before; and almost in the same words as then, a voice
as exulting, but less stern, said: "So you come at last to me, Jasper
Losely--you are come." Rapidly-flittingly, with a step noiseless as a
spectre's, Arabella Crane descended the stairs; but she did not, as when
he first sought that house in the years before, grasp his hand or
gaze into his face. Rather, it was with a shr