"And it is you, madam, whom I have to thank for it."
Lady Clinton set her lips tight, but did not reply.
Burgo rose, and taking up the cheque opened it, and let his eyes rest for a moment or two on the familiar signature.
"This is my answer to the offer of which you are the bearer," he said, looking her straight in the face; and with that he deliberately tore the cheque in four, and dropped the pieces on the table. "Never will I touch another shilling of my uncle's money as long as I live."
He turned and took up his hat. "I need not detain you further, Lady Clinton," he said. "But I cannot go without complimenting you on the thoroughly businesslike way in which you have carried out the task you set yourself to do. Madam, I have the honour to wish you a very good day."
He swept her a low bow, and as he did so his eyes crossed fire with hers. There was no flinching on either side. They both felt that henceforth it was a duel à outrance between them. But already Lady Clinton had drawn "first blood."
She rose as the door closed behind Burgo, and drew a deep breath. "So far the day is mine," she said, "but I shall be greatly surprised if I have seen the last of Mr. Burgo Brabazon. If I ever read mischief in anybody's eyes, I read it in his. I would give something to know what step he meditates first. In any case, it will be nothing dastardly, nothing underhand. Any one not a gentleman would have taken that cheque and have remained my enemy just the same. I am glad I have seen him; under other circumstances I feel that I could both like and admire him--and yet I must brush him from my path. He is the one great obstacle I have to contend against, and he must be sacrificed. If only he would have contented himself with the thousand guineas, and have given no further trouble! And now to give Sir Everard my own version of the interview," she added, as she took up the portions of the cheque and tore them into still smaller fragments.
[CHAPTER IV.]
"OLD GARDEN."
When the door of No. 22 Great Mornington Street clashed behind Mr. Brabazon, instead of at once proceeding about his business, whatever that might be, he paused on the topmost step and stared first up the street and then down it, like a man whose faculties for the time being had gone wool-gathering. But it was not so much that as it was the strange, sudden sense of homelessness which had come over him, for No. 22 might be said to be the only home he had known since he was quite a child, although during the last few years, since his uncle had taken to living so much abroad, he had crossed its threshold but seldom.