"Sir Francis Netherleigh!" she echoed, in surprise. "What, with that--that----" "That crime hanging over me. Speak up, Frances." "No; I was going to say that doubt," returned the outspoken girl. "I don't believe you were guilty: you know that, Gerard." "I have been there some little time now, Frances; and I came up tonight from the City to bring a note to him from Mr. Howard----" "Rather late, is it not, to be in the City?" "It is foreign post night, and we are very busy. A telegram came, of some importance, I believe, and Mr. Howard has enclosed it to Sir Francis." "But you owned to a mountain of debt in England, Gerard; you were afraid of arrest." "I have managed a portion of that, thanks to Sir Francis, and the rest they are going to let me square up by instalments." "And pray, if you have been back some time, why have you not come to see us?" "I don't care to encounter old acquaintances, Frances; still less to intrude voluntarily upon them. They might not like it, you see." "I see that you have taken up very ridiculous notions; that you are curiously altered." "Adversity alters most people. That bracelet has never been heard of?" "Oh, that's gone for good. No doubt melted down in a caldron, as the colonel calls it, and the diamonds reset. It remains a mystery of the past, and is never expected to be solved." "And they still suspect me! What is the matter with your dress?" "Matter enough," answered she, letting it down and turning round for his inspection. "I came here to get it repaired. That great booby, John Cust, did it for me." "Fanny, how is Alice Dalrymple?" "You have cause to ask after her! She is dying." "Dying!" repeated Gerard, in hushed, shocked tones. "I do not mean actually dying tonight, or going to die tomorrow; but that she is dying by slow degrees there is no doubt. It may be weeks yet, or months; perhaps years: I cannot tell." "Where is she?" "Still at Lady Sarah's. Just now she is making a short stay with her mother at Netherleigh. She went home also in the spring for a month, and when she came back Sarah was so shocked at the change in her that she called in medical advice, and we have been trying to nurse her up. It is all of no use: she grows thinner and weaker." "You are still at Lady Sarah's also?" "Oh, to be sure; I am a fixture there," laughed Frances. "Are the Hopes here tonight?" "Yes: or will be. They went out somewhere to dinner, and expected to be late." "Does my uncle ever speak of me less resentfully?" "Not he. I think his storming over it has only made his suspicion stronger. Not a week passes but he begins again about that detestable bracelet. He is unalterably persuaded that you took it, and no one must dare to put in a word in your defence." "And does your sister honour me with the same belief?" demanded the young man, bitterly. "Sarah is silent on the point to me: I think she scarcely knows what to believe. You see I tell you all freely, Gerard."