We must return for a moment to the fact that Hugh and Archie had returned to town before Harry Clavering.  How Archie had been engaged on great doings, the reader, I hope, will remember; and he may as well be informed here that the fifty pounds was duly taken to Mount Street, and were extracted from him by the spy without much difficulty.  I do not know that Archie in return obtained any immediate aid or valuable information from Sophie Gordeloup; but Sophie did obtain some information from him which she found herself able to use for her own purposes.  As his position with reference to love and marriage was being discussed, and the position also of the divine Julia, Sophie hinted her fear of another Clavering lover.  What did Archie think of his cousin Harry?  “Why; he’s engaged to another girl,” said Archie, opening wide his eyes and his mouth, and becoming very free with his information.  This was a matter to which Sophie found it worth her while to attend, and she soon learned from Archie all that Archie knew about Florence Burton.  And this was all that could be known.  No secret had been made in the family of Harry’s engagement.  Archie told his fair assistant that Miss Burton had been received at Clavering Park openly as Harry’s future wife, and, “by Jove, you know, he can’t be coming it with Julia after that, you know.”  Sophie made a little grimace, but did not say much.  She, remembering that she had caught Lady Ongar in Harry’s arms, thought that, “by Jove,” he might be coming it with Julia, even after Miss Burton’s reception at Clavering Park.  Then, too, she remembered some few words that had passed between her and her dear Julia after Harry’s departure on the evening of the embrace, and perceived that Julia was in ignorance of the very existence of Florence Burton, even though Florence had been received at the Park.  This was information worth having—­information to be used!  Her respect for Harry rose immeasurably.  She had not given him credit for so much audacity, so much gallantry, and so much skill.  She had thought him to be a pigheaded Clavering, like the rest of them.  He was not pigheaded; he was a promising young man; she could have liked him and perhaps aided him—­only that he had shown so strong a determination to have nothing to do with her.  Therefore the information should be used—­and it was used.

The reader will now understand what was the truth which Lady Ongar demanded from Harry Clavering.  “Harry, tell me the truth; tell me all the truth.”  She had come forward to meet him in the middle of the room when she spoke these words, and stood looking him in the face, not having given him her hand.

“What truth?” said Harry.  “Have I ever told you a lie?” But he knew well what was the truth required of him.