“Little, indeed!” sighed Lady Helen.  “I shall not recover from the shock for a month.  It was like a scene in a melodrama—­like a chapter of a sensation novel.  And you know that dreadful creature, Sir Jasper?”

“I used to know her,” the baronet said, with emphasis, “so many years ago that I had almost forgotten she ever existed.  She was always more or less mad, I fancy, and it seems hereditary.  Her daughter—­if daughter she be—­seems as distraught as her mother.”

“And her name, Sir Jasper?  You called her by some name, I think.”

“Zenith, I suppose.  To tell the truth, Lady Helen, the woman is neither more nor less than a gypsy fortune-teller crazed by a villainous life and villainous liquor.  But, for the sake of the days gone by, when she was young and pretty and told my fortune, I think I will go back and see what Mr. Green intends doing with her.  Such crazy vagrants should not be allowed to go at large.”

The light tone was a ghastly failure, and the smile but a death’s-head grin.  He placed Lady Helen in the carriage—­Mr. Carlyon assisted the nurse and little Mildred.  Then Sir Jasper gave the order, “Home,” and the stately carriage of the Kingslands, with its emblazoned crest, whirled away in a cloud of dust.  For an instant he stood looking after it.

“Curses on it!” he muttered between set teeth.  “After all these years, are those dead doings to be flung in my face?  I thought her dead and gone; and lo! in the hour of my triumph she rises as if from the grave to confound me.  Her daughter, too!  I never knew she had a child!  Good heavens! how these wild oats we sow in youth flourish and multiply with their bitter, bad fruit!”

He turned and strode into the vestry.  On the floor the miserable woman lay, her eyes closed, her jaw fallen.  By her side, supporting her head, the younger woman knelt, holding a glass of water to her lips.  The Reverend Cyrus Green stood gravely looking on.

“Is she dead?” Sir Jasper asked, in a hard voice.

It was to the clergyman he spoke, but the girl looked fiercely up, her tones like a serpent’s hiss.

“Not dead, Sir Jasper Kingsland!  No thanks to you for it!  Murderer—­as much a murderer as if you had cut her throat—­look on her, and be proud of the ruin you have wrought!”

“Silence, woman!” Mr. Green ordered, imperiously.  “We will have none of your mad recriminations here.  She is not dead, Sir Jasper, but she is dying, I think.  This young woman wishes to remove her—­whither, I know not—­but it is simply impossible.  That unfortunate creature will not be alive when to-morrow dawns.”

“What do you propose doing with her?” the baronet asked, steadily.

“We will convey her to the sexton’s house—­it is very near.  I have sent Dawson for a stretcher; he and Humphreys will carry her.  This young woman declines to give her name, or tell who she is, or where she lives.”