’No, my love, I had no grandparents.  I had a father, and he was all-sufficient—­anything beyond him in the ancestral line would have been a burden laid upon me greater than I could bear, as the poet says.’

Dinner was announced, and Mary came shyly out of her corner, blushing deeply.

‘And this is Lady Mary, I suppose?’ said Lady Kirkbank, in an off-hand way, ‘How do you do, my dear?  I am going to steal your sister.’

‘I am very glad,’ faltered Mary.  ’I mean I am glad that Lesbia should enjoy herself.’

’And some fine day, when Lesbia is married and a great lady, I shall ask you to come to Scotland,’ said Lady Kirkbank, condescendingly, and than she murmured in her friend’s ear, as they went to the dining-room, ‘Quite an English girl.  Very fresh and frank and nice,’ which was great praise for such a second-rate young person as Lady Mary.

‘What do you think of Lesbia?’ asked Lady Maulevrier, in the same undertone.

’She is simply adorable.  Your letters prepared me to expect beauty, but not such beauty.  My dear, I thought the progress of the human race was all in a downward line since our time; but your granddaughter is as handsome as you were in your first season, and that is going very far.’

CHAPTER XIV.

‘NOT YET.’

Lady Kirkbank carried off Lesbia early next day, the girl radiant at the idea of seeing life under new conditions.  She had a few minutes’ serious talk with her grandmother before she went.

‘Lesbia, you are going into the world,’ said Lady Maulevrier; ’yes, even a country house is the world in little.  You will have many admirers instead of one; but I think, I believe, that you will be true to me and to yourself.’

’You need not fear, grandmother.  I have been an idiot; but—­but it was only a passing folly, and I shall never be so weak again.’

Lesbia’s scornful lips and kindling eyes gave intensity to her speech.  It was evident that she despised herself for that one touch of womanly softness which had made her as ready to fall in love with her first wooer as any peasant girl in Grasmere Vale.

‘I am delighted to hear you speak thus, dearest,’ said Lady Maulevrier.  ’And if Mr. Hamilton—­Hammond, I mean—­should have the audacity to follow you to Kirkbank, and to intrude himself upon you there—­perhaps to persecute you with clandestine addresses——­’

‘I do not believe he would do anything clandestine,’ said Lesbia, drawing herself up.  ‘He is quite above that.’

’My dear child, we know absolutely nothing about him.  He has his way to make in the world unaided by family or connections.  He is clever—­daring.  Such a man cannot help being an adventurer; and an adventurer is capable of anything.  I warn you to beware of him.’

‘I don’t suppose I shall ever see his face again,’ retorted Lesbia, irritably.