Sir Howard Etherton, having got rid of his mother and eldest sister, established his sister Jane as mistress of his establishment. This young lady, the plainest of the five, greatly resembled her brother in disposition, and, finding it was useless to complain, adopted the plan of coinciding with him in all his ideas and projects. The three younger girls had henceforward two tyrants instead of one.
Sir Howard Etherton was quite the reverse of his brother Philip, who loved hunters and race-horses, women and wine. The baronet cared for none of these agreeable modes of dissipating a fortune. He had no objection to females, certainly, but they must be encumbered with large fortunes, of which he was extremely willing to take charge; but Miss Jane Etherton was in no hurry that her brother should find a wife until she had found a husband—a thing her youngest sister, Mary, who was a very pretty girl, told her, in a fit of passion at being thwarted in some wish, she would never get, as no man in his senses would marry a woman with such a nose.
Miss Jane’s prominent organ was a serious feature in her face, and troubled her very much. It was marvellously long, fearfully thin, and the point awfully red, whilst her face was extremely pale. Mary had good reason to repent her remark, for it was never forgotten.
One morning Sir Howard Etherton looked very troubled and serious at breakfast, and, as soon as he was alone with his sister Jane, she remarked it.
“Yes,” returned the Baronet, “what I heard yesterday is enough to make me look serious, and, in fact, to make us all look so.”
“What can it be?” said Miss Jane, the tip of her nose betraying her anxiety by increasing in colour. It seemed as if this organ alone betrayed her emotions, for her cheeks remained always colourless.
“You remember, of course, going to London with your father to see a young lady who styled herself his niece. He was to hear the contents of some papers contained in a casket, which that officious, proud fellow—who now, forsooth, claims to be Sir Oscar de Bracy—had the care of; a most confounded piece of imposture, depend upon it. But no matter about that now.”
“Dear me!” interrupted Miss Jane, “I remember about this Mabel Arden, as she called herself. Yes, we went to London, but it all turned out a hoax—there were nothing but shavings in the casket. My poor father was most vilely treated by a horrid Irish seaman, who used violent language. If he had been a gentleman my father intended horse-whipping him; but, on inquiry, he learned that he was nobody, so of course he never took any further notice of him, or the pretended Mabel Arden.”
“You are extremely eloquent this morning, Jane,” said the Baronet, with a caustic sneer—for even his pet sister was subject to his fits of spleen; “but you are quite out, I fear, in your ideas respecting Mabel Arden. I will read you my solicitor’s letter, which I received yesterday evening;” and, putting his hand into his pocket-book, he pulled out a letter, which he read aloud:—
“My Dear Sir,