Had she not thrown from her all her chances of happiness? Was it possible that he should come to her yet again,—a third time? No; it was not possible. The very mode and pride of this, her second rejection of him, made it impossible. In coming to her determination, and making her avowal, she had been actuated by the knowledge that Lady Lufton would regard such a marriage with abhorrence. Lady Lufton would not and could not ask her to condescend to be her son’s bride. Her chance of happiness, of glory, of ambition, of love, was all gone. She had sacrificed everything, not to virtue, but to pride; and she had sacrificed not only herself, but him. When first he came there—when she had meditated over his first visit—she had hardly given him credit for deep love; but now—there could be no doubt that he loved her now. After his season in London, his days and nights passed with all that was beautiful, he had returned there, to that little country parsonage, that he might again throw himself at her feet. And she—she had refused to see him, though she loved him with all her heart; she had refused to see him, because she was so vile a coward that she could not bear the sour looks of an old woman! “I will come down directly,” she said, when Fanny at last knocked at the door, begging to be admitted. “I won’t open it, love, but I will be with you in ten minutes; I will, indeed.” And so she was; not, perhaps, without traces of tears, discernible by the experienced eye of Mrs. Robarts, but yet with a smooth brow, and voice under her own command. “I wonder whether she really loves him,” Mark said to his wife that night. “Love him!” his wife had answered; “indeed she does; and, Mark, do not be led away by the stern quiet of her demeanour. To my thinking she is a girl who might almost die for love.” On the next day Lord Lufton left Framley; and started, according to his arrangements, for the Norway salmon fishing. CHAPTER XXXII. THE GOAT AND COMPASSES. Harold Smith had been made unhappy by that rumour of a dissolution; but the misfortune to him would be as nothing compared to the severity with which it would fall on Mr. Sowerby. Harold Smith might or might not lose his borough, but Mr. Sowerby would undoubtedly lose his county; and, in losing that, he would lose everything. He felt very certain now that the duke would not support him again, let who would be master of Chaldicotes; and as he reflected on these things he found it very hard to keep up his spirits.