Miss Porkman came. She was a florid young woman, with bold brown eyes, an affectation of short sight, an eye-glass, and an insatiable thirst for masculine society. Contemplated from an abstract ethnological point of view, she was a remarkably interesting example of the depth of deterioration to which the womanly character can descend among the well-to-do classes; but she was an excruciating young woman to live with. In her mind the business of a woman’s life was flirtation. To be admired, to agitate the hearts of men, to lure the luckless Strephon from his legitimate Chloe, these things, in Miss Porkman’s mind, constituted woman’s mission. She was not strong-minded, she was no eager reformer, she didn’t care twopence about universal suffrage; but she wanted to be the Cleopatra of her small world, to have Cæsar, and Pompey, and Antonius, and the young Augustus, and every man of them subjugated and adoring. She had unlimited confidence in her own good looks, and a scornful pity for plain women, with whom nobody cared to flirt. The fair Vanessa had tried her hardest to entangle Captain Standish in those flowery chains which she kept in stock for all eligible victims, but the captain had not allowed himself to be bound. She had seen with disgust that he was a constant guest at the Park, and that he lavished upon Bella those attentions which she had herself unsuccessfully invited. To flirt with a married woman was in Miss Porkman’s eyes not so much immoral as it was cowardly. She would have excused the immorality, but she could not forgive the cowardice. Here was evidently a man who feared to trust himself within the range of her charms, lest he should be caught unawares and meshed in the matrimonial net, and who amused himself with a vapid flirtation in a quarter where he felt himself ignobly safe. ‘He can’t care for such a little waxen image as Mrs. Piper,’ said Miss Porkman, contemplating her Juno-like figure in her cheval-glass, ‘but he doesn’t want to marry into the commercial classes, and he’s afraid to trust himself with _me_.’ Vanessa came to Little Yafford Park, resolved to leave it a conqueror. She brought her prettiest dresses. She brought her horse, and she believed herself invincible on horseback. If Captain Standish was as much at the Park as report said he was, Vanessa felt sure of victory. She was not disappointed. Captain Standish came every day, and rode every day on the moor with Bella and Miss Porkman. He taught Bella how to manage the black, and he was sufficiently attentive to Vanessa to keep that young lady in perpetual good humour with herself and him. Bella’s pluck, which was undeniable, made up in a great measure for her want of experience. In a week she was mistress of Erebus, and seemed well able to cope with his whims and uncertainties, his disposition to take fright at shadows, and to bolt on every inconvenient occasion.