The doctor, as he went downstairs, muttered something about Sir Abraham Haphazard, and Sir Rickety Giggs; but these great names were much thrown away upon poor Mary.  The doctor entered the room first, and the heiress followed him with downcast eyes and timid steps.  She was at first afraid to advance, but when she did look up, and saw Frank standing alone by the window, her lover restored her courage, and rushing up to him, she threw herself into his arms.  ’Oh, Frank; my own Frank! my own Frank! we shall never be separated again.’

CHAPTER XLVII

HOW THE BRIDE WAS RECEIVED, AND WHO WERE ASKED TO THE WEDDING

And thus after all did Frank perform his duty; he did marry money; or rather, as the wedding has not yet taken place, and is, indeed, as yet hardly talked of, we should more properly say that he had engaged himself to marry money.  And then, such a quantity of money! the Scatcherd wealth greatly exceeded the Dunstable wealth; so that our hero may be looked on as having performed his duties in a manner deserving the very highest commendation from all classes of the De Courcy connexion.

And he received it.  But that was nothing.  That he should be feted by the De Courcys and the Greshams, now that he was about to do his duty by his family in so exemplary a manner:  that he should be patted on the back, now that he no longer meditated that vile crime which had been so abhorrent to his mother’s soul; this was only natural; this is hardly worthy of remark.  But there was another to be feted, another person to be made a personage, another blessed human mortal about to do her duty by the family of Gresham in a manner that deserved, and should receive, Lady Arabella’s warmest caresses.

Dear Mary!  It was, indeed, not singular that she should be prepared to act so well, seeing that in early youth she had had the advantage of an education in the Greshamsbury nursery; but not on that account was it the less fitting that her virtue should be acknowledged, eulogized, nay, all but worshipped.

How the party at the doctor’s got itself broken up, I am not prepared to say.  Frank, I know, stayed, and dined there, and his poor mother, who would not retire to rest till she had kissed him, and blessed him, and thanked him for all he was doing for the family, was kept waiting in her dressing-room till a very unreasonable hour of the night.

It was the squire who brought the news up to the house.  ‘Arabella,’ he said, in a low, but somewhat solemn voice, ’you will be surprised at the news I bring you.  Mary Thorne is the heiress to all the Scatcherd property!’

‘Oh, heavens!  Mr Gresham.’

‘Yes, indeed,’ continued the squire.  ‘So it is; it is very, very—­’ But Lady Arabella had fainted.  She was a woman who generally had her feelings and her emotions much under her own control; but what she now heard was too much for her.  When she came to her senses, the first words that escaped her lips were, ‘Dear Mary!’