“I do not know that I have forgotten anything.”

Then she paused before she could summon courage to ask him another question.  “You have made no promise of marriage to Miss O’Hara?” He sat dumb, but still looking at her with that angry frown.  “Surely your uncle has a right to expect that you will answer that question.”

“I am quite sure that for his sake it will be much better that no such questions shall be asked me.”

In point of fact he had answered the question.  When he would not deny that such promise had been made, there could no longer be any doubt of the truth of what Lady Mary had written.  Of course the whole truth had now been elicited.  He was not married but he was engaged;—­engaged to a girl of whom he knew nothing, a Roman Catholic, Irish, fatherless, almost nameless,—­to one who had never been seen in good society, one of whom no description could be given, of whom no record could be made in the peerage that would not be altogether disgraceful, a girl of whom he was ashamed to speak before those to whom he owed duty and submission!

That there might be a way to escape the evil even yet Lady Scroope acknowledged to herself fully.  Many men promise marriage but do not keep the promise they have made.  This lady, who herself was really good,—­unselfish, affectionate, religious, actuated by a sense of duty in all that she did, whose life had been almost austerely moral, entertained an idea that young men, such as Fred Neville, very commonly made such promises with very little thought of keeping them.  She did not expect young men to be governed by principles such as those to which young ladies are bound to submit themselves.  She almost supposed that heaven had a different code of laws for men and women in her condition of life, and that salvation was offered on very different terms to the two sexes.  The breach of any such promise as the heir of Scroope could have made to such a girl as this Miss O’Hara would be a perjury at which Jove might certainly be expected to laugh.  But in her catalogue there were sins for which no young men could hope to be forgiven; and the sin of such a marriage as this would certainly be beyond pardon.

Of the injury which was to be done to Miss O’Hara, it may be said with certainty that she thought not at all.  In her eyes it would be no injury, but simple justice,—­no more than a proper punishment for intrigue and wicked ambition.  Without having seen the enemy to the family of Scroope, or even having heard a word to her disparagement, she could feel sure that the girl was bad,—­that these O’Haras were vulgar and false impostors, persons against whom she could put out all her strength without any prick of conscience.  Women in such matters are always hard against women, and especially hard against those whom they believe to belong to a class below their own.  Certainly no feeling of mercy would induce her to hold her hand in this task of saving her husband’s