Lady Newhaven lay on the sofa in her morning-room in her long black draperies, her small hands folded.  They were exquisite, little blue-veined hands.  There were no rings on them except a wedding-ring.  Her maid, who had been living in an atmosphere of pleasurable excitement since Lord Newhaven’s death, glanced with enthusiastic admiration at her mistress.  Lady Newhaven was a fickle, inconsiderate mistress, but at this moment her behavior was perfect.  She, Angelique, knew what her own part should be, and played it with effusion.  She suffered no one to come into the room.  She, who would never do a hand’s turn for the English servants, put on coal with her own hands.  She took the lamps from the footman at the door.  Presently she brought in a little tray with food and wine, and softly besought “Miladi” to eat.  Perhaps the mistress and maid understood each other.  Lady Newhaven impatiently shook her head, and Angelique wrung her hands.  In the end Angelique prevailed.

“Have they all gone?” Lady Newhaven asked, after the little meal was finished, and, with much coaxing, she had drunk a glass of champagne.

Angelique assured her they were all gone, the relations who had come to the funeral—­“Milor Windham and l’Honorable Carson” were the last.  They were dining with Miss West, and were leaving immediately after dinner by the evening express.

“Ask Miss West to come to me as soon as they have gone,” she said.

Angelique hung about the room, and was finally dismissed.

Lady Newhaven lay quite still, watching the fire.  A great peace had descended upon that much-tossed soul.  The dreadful restlessness of the last weeks was gone.  The long suspense, prolonged beyond its time, was over.  The shock of its ending, which shattered her at first, was over too.  She was beginning to breathe again, to take comfort once more:  not the comfort that Rachel had tried so hard to give her, but the comfort of feeling that happiness and ease were in store for her once more; that these five hideous months were to be wiped out, and not her own past, to which she still secretly clung, out of which she was already building her future.

“It is December now.  Hugh and I shall be married next December, D.V., not before.  We will be married quietly in London and go abroad.  I shall have a few tailor-made gowns from Vernon, but I shall wait for my other things till I am in Paris on my way back.  The boys will be at school by then.  Pauly is rather young, but they had better go together, and they need not come home for the holidays just at first.  I don’t think Hugh would care to have the boys always about.  I won’t keep my title.  I hate everything to do with him”—­(Lord Newhaven was still him)—­“and I know the Queen does not like it.  I will be presented as Mrs. Scarlett, and we will live at his place in Shropshire, and at last we shall be happy.  Hugh will never turn against me as he did.”