“As much as I do?” asked the lady, with a treacherous smile.

“Very nearly,” was the young courtier’s reply.  She went on to console her aunt’s unselfish solicitude, by assuring her that Font Abbey was not a solitude; that dinners and balls abounded, and her uncle was invited to them all.

“You little goose, don’t you see? all those invitations are for your sake, not his.  If we could look in on him now we should find him literally in single cursedness.  Those county folks are not without cunning.  They say beauty has come to stay with the beast; we must ask the beast to dinner, so then beauty will come along with him.

“What other pleasure awaits you at Font Abbey?”

“The pleasure of giving pleasure,” replied Lucy, apologetically.

“Ah! that is your weakness, Lucy.  It is all very well with those who won’t take advantage; but it is the wrong game to play with all the world.  You will be made a tool of, and a slave of, and use of.  I speak from experience.  You know how I sacrifice myself to those I love; luckily, they are not many.”

“Not so many as love you, dear.”

“Heaven forbid! but you are at the head of them all, and I am going to prove it—­by deeds, not words.”

Lucy looked up at this additional feature in her aunt’s affection.

“You must go to the great bear’s den for three months, but it shall be the last time!” Lucy said nothing.

“You will return never to quit us, or, at all events, not the neighborhood.”

“That—­would be nice,” said the courtier warmly, but hesitatingly; “but how will you gain uncle’s consent?”

“By dispensing with it.”

“Yes; but the means, aunt?”

“A husband!”

Lucy started and colored all over, and looked askant at her aunt with opening eyes, like a thoroughbred filly just going to start all across the road.  Mrs. Bazalgette laid a loving hand on her shoulder, and whispered knowingly in her ear:  “Trust to me; I’ll have one ready for you against you come back this time.”

“No, please don’t! pray don’t!” cried Lucy, clasping her hands in feeble-minded distress.

“In this neighborhood—­one of the right sort.”

“I am so happy as I am.”

“You will be happier when you are quite a slave, and so I shall save you from being snapped up by some country wiseacre, and marry you into our own set.”

“Merchant princes,” suggested Lucy, demurely, having just recovered her breath and what little sauce there was in her.

“Yes, merchant princes—­the men of the age—­the men who could buy all the acres in the country without feeling it—­the men who make this little island great, and a woman happy, by letting her have everything her heart can desire.”

“You mean everything that money can buy.”

“Of course.  I said so, didn’t I?”

“So, then, you are tired of me in the house?” remonstrated Lucy, sadly.