For the first time Angela’s courage really gave way as she heard these dreadful words.  She remembered how she herself had called Lady Bellamy an embodiment of the “Spirit of Power,” and now she felt that the comparison was just.  The woman was power incarnate, and her words, which from anybody else she would have laughed at, sent a cold chill through her.

“She is a fine creature both in mind and body,” reflected Lady Bellamy, as she stepped into her carriage.  “Really, though I try to hate her, I can find it in my heart to be sorry for her.  Indeed, I am not sure that I do not like her; certainly I respect her.  But she has come in my path and must be crushed—­my own safety demands it.  At least, she is worth crushing, and the game is fair, for perhaps she will crush me.  I should not be surprised; there is a judgment in those grey eyes of hers—­Qui vivra verra.  Home, William.”

CHAPTER XXXVII

Angela’s appeal for protection set Philip thinking.

As the reader is aware, his sole motive in consenting to become, as it were, a sleeping partner in the shameful plot, of which his innocent daughter was the object, was to obtain possession of his lost inheritance, and it now occurred to him that even should that plot succeed, which he very greatly doubted, nothing had as yet been settled as to the terms upon which it was to be reconveyed to him.  The whole affair was excessively repugnant to him:  indeed, he regarded the prospect of its success with little less than terror, only his greed over-mastered his fear.

But on one point he was very clear:  it should not succeed except upon the very best of terms for himself, his daughter should not be sacrificed unless the price paid for the victim was positively princely, such guilt was not to be incurred for a bagatelle.  If George married Angela, the Isleworth estates must pass back into his hands for a very low sum indeed.  But would his cousin be willing to accept such a sum?  That was the rub, and that, too, was what must be made clear without any further delay.  He had no wish to see Angela put to needless suffering, suffering which would not bring an equivalent with it, and which might, on the contrary, entail consequences upon himself that he shuddered to think of.

Curiously enough, however, he had of late been signally free from his superstitious fears; indeed, since the night when he had so astonished Arthur by his outbreak about the shadows on the wall, no fit had come to trouble him, and he was beginning to look upon the whole thing as an evil dream, a nightmare that he had at last lived down.  But still the nightmare might return, and he was not going to run the risk unless he was very well paid for it.  And so he determined to offer a price so low for the property that no man in his senses would accept it, and then wrote a note to George asking him to come over on the following evening after dinner, as he wished to speak to him on a matter of business.