His friend Sir James Brooke’s parting advice occurred to our hero; his eyes began to open to Lady Dashfort’s character; and he was, from this moment, freed from her power.  Lady Isabel, however, had taken no part in all this—­she was blameless; and, independently of her mother, and in pretended opposition of sentiment, she might have continued to retain the influence she had gained over Lord Colambre, but that a slight accident revealed to him her real disposition.

It happened, on the evening of this day, that Lady Isabel came into the library with one of the young ladies of the house, talking very eagerly, without perceiving Lord Colambre, who was sitting in one of the recesses reading.

‘My dear creature, you are quite mistaken,’ said Lady Isabel, ’he was never a favourite of mine; I always detested him; I only flirted with him to plague his wife.  Oh that wife, my dear Elizabeth, I do hate!’ cried she, clasping her hands, and expressing hatred with all her soul and with all her strength.  ’I detest that Lady de Cresey to such a degree, that, to purchase the pleasure of making her feel the pangs of jealousy for one hour, look, I would this moment lay down this finger and let it be cut off.’

The face, the whole figure of Lady Isabel at this moment appeared to Lord Colambre suddenly metamorphosed; instead of the soft, gentle, amiable female, all sweet charity and tender sympathy, formed to love and to be loved, he beheld one possessed and convulsed by an evil spirit—­her beauty, if beauty it could be called, the beauty of a fiend.  Some ejaculation, which he unconsciously uttered, made Lady Isabel start.  She saw him—­saw the expression of his countenance, and knew that all was over.

Lord Colambre, to the utter astonishment and disappointment of Lady Dashfort, and to the still greater mortification of Lady Isabel, announced this night that it was necessary he should immediately pursue his tour in Ireland.  We pass over all the castles in the air which the young ladies of the family had built, and which now fell to the ground.  We pass all the civil speeches of Lord and Lady Killpatrick; all the vehement remonstrances of Lady Dashfort; and the vain sighs of Lady Isabel, To the last moment Lady Dashfort said—­

‘He will not go.’

But he went; and, when he was gone, Lady Dashfort exclaimed, ’That man has escaped from me.’  And after a pause, turning to her daughter, she, in the most taunting and contemptuous terms, reproached her as the cause of this failure, concluding by a declaration that she must in future manage her own affairs, and had best settle her mind to marry Heathcock, since every one else was too wise to think of her.