"Anderson! I should like to see him. I hope he'll come and see me. Where's he stopping? I shall go out to-morrow."
"You'll do no such thing, Frederick," interposed Mrs. St. John.
"What a charming girl is Miss Lucy Arkell!" exclaimed Mrs. James to Travice. "She puts me greatly in mind of her mother, and yet she is not like her in the face. There is the same expression though, and she has the same gentle, sweet, modest manners. I like Lucy Arkell."
"So do I," cried Mr. St. John. "If my heart were not bespoken, I'm sure I should give it to her."
The words were uttered jestingly; nevertheless, Mrs. St. John glanced up uneasily. Frederick saw it. He knew in what direction his heart was expected to be given, and he stole a glance involuntarily at Lady Anne; but it passed from her immediately to rest upon his mother—a glance in which there was incipient rebellion to the wishes of his family; and Mrs. St. John had feared that it might be so, since the day when he had said, in his off-hand way, that Anne St. John was not the wife for his money.
Mrs. St. John's pulses were beating a shade quicker. There might be truth in his present careless assertion, that his heart was bespoken.
END OF VOL. I.
LONDON:
SAVILL AND EDWARDS, PRINTERS, CHANDOS STREET,
COVENT GARDEN.