“Certainly.  Will you dine with us?”

“No; after dinner; when the children are in bed.”  Then he went, leaving on the mind of Theodore Burton an impression that though something was much amiss, his mother had been wrong in her fears respecting Lady Ongar.

Chapter XXXI

Freshwater Gate

Count Pateroff, Sophie’s brother, was a man who, when he had taken a thing in hand, generally liked to carry it through.  It may perhaps be said that most men are of this turn of mind; but the count was, I think, especially eager in this respect.  And as he was not one who had many irons in the fire, who made either many little efforts, or any great efforts after things altogether beyond his reach, he was justified in expecting success.  As to Archie’s courtship, any one who really knew the man and the woman, and who knew anything of the nature of women in general, would have predicted failure for him.  Even with Doodle’s aid he could not have a chance in the race.  But when Count Pateroff entered himself for the same prize, those who knew him would not speak of his failure as a thing certain.

The prize was too great not to be attempted by so very prudent a gentleman.  He was less impulsive in his nature than his sister, and did not open his eyes and talk with watering mouth of the seven thousands of pounds a year; but in his quiet way he had weighed and calculated all the advantages to be gained, had even ascertained at what rate he could insure the lady’s life, and had made himself certain that nothing in the deed of Lord Ongar’s marriage-settlement entailed any pecuniary penalty on his widow’s second marriage.  Then he had gone down, as we know, to Ongar Park, and as he had walked from the lodge to the house and back again, he had looked around him complacently, and told himself that the place would do very well.  For the English character, in spite of the pigheadedness of many Englishmen, he had—­as he would have said himself—­much admiration, and he thought that the life of a country gentleman, with a nice place of his own—­with such a very nice place of his own as was Ongar Park—­and so very nice an income, would suit him well in his declining years.

And he had certain advantages, certain aids toward his object, which had come to him from circumstances; as, indeed, he had also certain disadvantages.  He knew the lady, which was in itself much.  He knew much of the lady’s history, and had that cognizance of the saddest circumstances of her life, which in itself creates an intimacy.  It is not necessary now to go back to those scenes which had disfigured the last months of Lord Ongar’s life, but the reader will understand that what had then occurred gave the count a possible footing as a suitor.  And the reader will also understand the disadvantages which had at this time already shown themselves in the lady’s refusal to see the count.