“Are you going to rend anybody?”

“I do not know as yet.”

“I wish you would let me go down with you.”

“No; that you certainly cannot.  You must not come even into the station with me.  You have been very good to me.  You will not now turn against me.”

“I certainly will do nothing—­but what you tell me.”

“Then here we are,—­and now you must go.  Jane can carry my hand-bag and cloak.  If you choose to come in the evening at ten it will be an additional favour.”

“I certainly will do so.  But Miss Trefoil, one word.”  They were now standing under cover of the portico in front of the railway station, into which he was not to be allowed to enter.  “What I fear is this; that in your first anger you may be tempted to do something which may be injurious to your prospects in life”

“I have no prospects in life, Mr. Green.”

“Ah;—­that is just it.  There are for most of us moments of unhappiness in which we are tempted by our misery to think that we are relieved at any rate from the burden of caution, because nothing that can occur to us can make us worse than we are.”

“Nothing can make me worse than I am.”

“But in a few months or weeks,” continued Mounser Green, bringing up in his benevolence all the wisdom of his experience, “we have got a new footing amidst our troubles, and then we may find how terrible is the injury which our own indiscretion has brought on us.  I do not want to ask any questions, but—­it might be so much better that you should abandon your intention, and go back with me.”

She seemed to be almost undecided for a moment as she thought over his words.  But she remembered her pledge to herself that Lord Rufford should find that she had not done with him yet.  “I must go,” she said in a hoarse voice.

“If you must-”

“I must go.  I have no way out of it.  Good-bye, Mr. Green; I cannot tell you how much obliged to you I am.”  Then he turned back and she went into the station and took two first-class tickets for Rufford.  At that moment Lord Rufford was turning himself comfortably in his bed.  How would he have sprung up, and how would he have fled, had he known the evil that was coming upon him!  This happened on a Thursday, a day on which, as Arabella knew, the U.R.U. did not go out;—­the very Thursday on which John Morton was buried and the will was read at Bragton.

She was fully determined to speak her mind to the man and to be checked by no feminine squeamishness.  She would speak her mind to him if she could force her way into his presence.  And in doing this she would be debarred by no etiquette.  It might be that she would fail, that he would lack the courage to see her, and would run away, even before all his servants, when he should hear who was standing in his hall.  But if he did so she would try again, even though she should have to ride out into the hunting-field after him.  Face to face she would tell him that he was a liar and a slanderer and no gentleman, though she should have to run round the world to catch him.  When she reached Rufford she went to the town and ordered breakfast and a carriage.  As soon as she had eaten the meal she desired the driver in a clear voice to take her to Rufford Hall.  Was her maid to go with her?  No.  She would be back soon, and her maid would wait there till she had returned.