The finish of it must be to-morrow.  He refrained from saying so, and simply appointed to-morrow for the resumption of the wrestle, departing in his invincible coat of patience:  which one has to wear when dealing with a woman like Charlotte, he informed Mr. Eglett, on his way out at a later hour than on the foregone day.  Mr. Eglett was of his opinion, that an introduction of lawyers into a family dispute was ’rats in the pantry’; and he would have joined him in his gloomy laugh, if the thought of Charlotte in a contention had not been so serious a matter.  She might be beaten; she could not be brought to yield.

She retired to her bedroom, and laid herself flat on her bed, immoveable, till her maid undressed her for the night.  A cup of broth and strip of toast formed her sole nourishment.  As for her doctor’s possible reproaches, the symptoms might crowd and do their worst; she fought for the honour of her family.

At midday of the third day Lady Charlotte was reduced to the condition of those fortresses which wave defiantly the flag, but deliver no further shot, awaiting the assault.  Her body, affected by hideous old age, succumbed.  Her will was unshaken.  She would not write to her bankers.  Mr. Eglett might go to them, if he thought fit.  Rowsley was to understand that he might call himself married; she would have no flower-basket bunch of a sister-in-law thrust upon her.

Lord Ormont and Mr. Eglett walked down to her bankers in the afternoon.  As a consequence of express injunctions given by my lady five years previously, the assistant-manager sought an interview with her.

The jewels were lodged at her house the day ensuing.  They were examined, verified by the list in Lady Charlotte’s family record-book, and then taken away—­forcibly, of course—­by her brother.

He laughed in his dry manner; but the reminiscent glimpses, helping him to see the humour of it, stirred sensations of the tug it had been with that combative Charlotte, and excused him for having shrunk from the encounter until he conceived it to be necessary.

Settlement of the affair with Morsfield now claimed his attention.  The ironical tolerance he practised in relation to Morsfield when Aminta had no definite station before the world changed to an angry irritability at the man’s behaviour now that she had stepped forth under his acknowledgement of her as the Countess of Ormont.  He had come round to a rather healthier mind regarding his country, and his introduction of the Countess of Ormont to the world was his peace-offering.

As he returned home earlier on the third day, he found his diligent secretary at work.  The calling on Captain May and the writing to the sort of man were acts obnoxious to his dignity; so he despatched Weyburn to the captain’s house, one in a small street of three narrow tenements abutting on aristocracy and terminating in mews.  Weyburn’s mission was to give the earl’s address at Great Marlow for the succeeding days, and to see Captain May, if the captain was at home.  During his absence the precious family jewel-box was locked in safety.  Aminta and her friend, little Miss Collett, were out driving, by the secretary’s report.  The earl considered it a wholesome feature of Aminta’s character that she should have held to her modest schoolmate the fact spoke well for both of them.