A MONTH or five weeks went by at Rosham almost without incident. For the moment money troubles were in abeyance, seeing that the payment of the interest due on the mortgages was not pressed, and the sale of Lady Graves’s jewels had provided sufficient funds to meet the most immediate claims, to pay household expenses, and even to provide for Ellen’s trousseau upon a moderate scale. By degrees Henry regained the use of his injured limb, though it was now evident that he would carry the traces of his accident to the grave in the shape of a pronounced limp. In all other respects he was bodily as well as ever he had been, though he remained much troubled in mind. Of Joan he had heard nothing; and it appeared that nobody knew where she had gone, or what she was doing, except possibly Mr. Levinger, whom he scarcely cared to ask for tidings. That her aunt did not know was evident from the fact that one morning she arrived at the Hall, and, adopting a tone in which obsequiousness and violence were curiously mixed, taxed him roundly with having spirited her niece away. In vain did Henry assure her that he knew no more of Joan’s whereabouts than she did herself; since she either did not or would not believe him, and at length departed, breathing threats that if the girl was not forthcoming shortly she would “make it hot for him, baronet or no baronet.” For his part Henry was somewhat at a loss to understand Mrs. Gillingwater’s conduct, since he knew well that she had no sort of affection for her niece, and it was obvious from her words that she was rather proud than otherwise of the gossip connecting Joan’s name with his own. “I know all about your goings on,” she had said, “though I haven’t come here to preach to you, for that’s your affair and hers; but I do say that if you call yourself a gentleman you should do what is handsome by the girl, seeing that you’ve stood in the way of her making a good marriage; and, to put it plump, Sir Henry, I think that you are in duty bound to do something for me too, bearing in mind all the ‘truck’ that I’ve had about the two of you, and that one has been taken away from me as was dearer than a daughter.” The real explanation of this estimable person’s behaviour was twofold. In the first place, Joan being gone, she had lost the monthly sum that was paid for her board, and in the second she had been bribed by Samuel Rock to win the secret of her hiding-place from Henry. In due course Mrs. Gillingwater reported the failure of her mission to Samuel, who, needless to say, did not believe a word of Henry’s denial. Indeed, he accused Mrs. Gillingwater first of being a fool, and next of taking money from the enemy as well as from himself, with the result that a very pretty quarrel ensued between the pair of them.