And as the girl sat in her room, careless of who came to the house or left it, with the one awful conviction upon her that he had passed away 'to that unutterable mystery and greeting which mortal eye hath not seen, nor ear heard.' Her beautiful face grew all lined and haggard, and her dark-rimmed eyes, in their peculiar glitter, told of many a sleepless night and of much mental anguish. Lord Cadbury, as we have elsewhere said, hated sick-rooms, 'and all that sort of thing;' still more did he hate death-beds, funerals, and all connected therewith. And when last at Chilcote, seeing that the end was not far off--indeed, the doctors had said so--he went back to town to await the final catastrophe, 'the double event,' that would rid him of a querulous friend, and place that friend's daughter more completely at his mercy--yea, and the mercy of Fate! In reply to the posted announcements of the death, his card came to Alison in a black-edged envelope, sealed with his coronet in black wax. He did not attempt--even with all his pretences and past protestations--to indite a sham letter of condolence, nor did she miss it. 'Dead--dead at last!' muttered Cadbury, as he sat in the sunny bow-window of the club looking out on busy Pall Mall, his ferret-like eyes glittering cunningly and leeringly as he tugged his white, horseshoe-shaped moustachios. 'Well, he's a loss to no one but the girl herself--not even to his creditors now--the vain old Scotch pump, with his pedigree and his ancestry, his heraldry and his beggarly bosh! But I would like to know who the devil sent that mysterious thousand pounds! It may be a trump-card for me yet.' Cadbury began to consider his plans anew. He would get Alison up to London and give her a letter of introduction--as companion or something of that kind--to a now somewhat _passé_ 'lady friend' of his, who occupied a tiny villa at St. John's Wood, and drove a brougham, of course, who would 'soon contrive to make it all straight for him;' and he chuckled as he thought of the success that, through her, would eventually be his. Anyway, the proud Alison would find some difficulty in 'cresting up' her haughty little head after her residence at St. John's Wood. Lord Cadbury could not come to the quiet and hasty funeral at Chilcote; he was 'too indisposed.' Certainly Alison did not want him. She had had quite enough of the peer, and hoped never to see his face again. 'Better awa', Miss Alison, better awa'; his absence is guid companie,' said Archie, who could not endure Cadbury, and loathed his dandified groom Gaskins. ''Od, missie, he's worth nae weal that canna bide wae. May he dee like a trooper's horse, wi' his shoon on!' added Archie, through his set teeth.