If she had come to entertain the project of marrying Hero Vanbrugh to her prodigal son as a last means of averting the terrible catastrophe of Molly Finucane, she did so honestly, considering that she offered a privilege to Hero, corresponding with the greatness of the interest at stake. It was in the perfect simplicity of this conviction that she had so candidly revealed her design. In the same spirit she had been ready to take Alistair’s brother into her confidence without any apprehension that she might be applying the spur of rivalry to a slumbering admiration. She was familiar with the Duke’s expressed views on matrimony, which she respected, although they struck a little cold on her own more emotional nature. She knew that he had made up his mind from an early age to two things--that he was one of the best matches in Great Britain, and that marriage was the most important card he had to play in the game of life. It had long been understood between them that Trent was in no hurry; that what he required in a wife was a great fortune, accompanied by those social graces which count for so much in politics; and that when he found a possessor of both these gifts who pleased him she would become his Duchess. The mother lived in the mild expectation of hearing some day that her young sultan had thrown the handkerchief to a fitting aspirant, whom it would be her part to welcome with what tenderness was permitted, and in whose favour she would cheerfully resign her place in Colonsay House. Thus it lay altogether outside her calculations that her eldest son could take any interest in Hero Vanbrugh warmer than a passing friendship. The prudent young statesman was the last person in the world whom anyone acquainted with him would have believed capable of a romantic passion. And the last person in the world to believe it would have been the young Minister himself. A man who has lived to the age of thirty without ever losing his head in the company of a woman naturally regards himself as love-proof, and perhaps insensibly relaxes his self-defence. But Hero Vanbrugh enjoyed one great advantage over almost every unmarried girl whom Trent had ever met, inasmuch as she had not come before him as a candidate for the orange-blossoms. If he had met her in one of those crowded ballrooms where her sisters are paraded nightly in the London season for the allurement of intending purchasers, Trent would have carefully guarded himself from giving her a second thought. He had met her for the first time at his own table, lunching in outdoor costume with his mother, who introduced her as a helper in her charitable work. The Duke, presuming that Miss Vanbrugh came from some humble clerical circle, unbent from his ordinary reserve in the desire to put her at her ease. He was rewarded for this kindly effort by the discovery that she was beautiful and charming.