The girl began to observe, too, that her father spoke of her marriage as of something speedily approaching, and that he, Lady Diana, and even Arthur, seemed to understand that she would spend much of her time away from Trevlyn, when once that ceremony had taken place. Her father and brother spoke cheerfully of her leaving them, taking it for granted that her affianced husband was first in her thoughts, and that they must make her way easy to go away with him, without one regret for those left behind. Lady Diana, with more of feminine insight, had less of kindliness in her method of approaching the subject; but when she found them all agreed upon the point, the girl felt almost as if she had been betrayed. There was no Randolph to shield and protect her. She could not put into written words the tumult of her conflicting feelings; she could only struggle and suffer, and feel like a wild thing trapped in the hunter’s toils. Ah, if only Randolph had not left her! But when the poison had done its work, she ceased even to wish for him back. Another enemy to her peace of mind was Conrad Fitzgerald. Monica was growing to feel a great repugnance to this fair-haired, smooth-tongued man, despite the nominal friendship that existed between him and those of her name. She knew that her feelings were changing towards him; but, like other young things, she was ashamed of any such change, regarding it as treacherous and ungenerous, especially after the pledge she had given him. Conrad thus found opportunities of seeing her from time to time, and set to work with malicious pleasure to poison her mind against her affianced husband. She would not listen to a single direct word against him: that he discovered almost at once, somewhat to his astonishment and chagrin; but “there are more ways of killing a cat than by hanging it,” as he said to himself; and a well-directed shaft steeped in poison, and launched with a practised hand, struck home and did its work only too well. He insinuated that after her marriage Trevlyn would never be her home during her father’s life-time, at least, possibly never any more. Randolph had property of his own; was it likely he would bury himself and his beautiful young wife in a desolate place like that? Of course her care of Arthur would be a thing entirely put on one side. It was out of the question that she should ever be allowed to devote herself to him as of old, when once she had placed her neck beneath the matrimonial yoke. Most likely some excuse would be forthcoming to rid Trevlyn of the undesirable presence of the invalid. Randolph was not a man to be deterred by any nice scruples from going his own way. Words spoken before marriage were never regarded seriously when once the inevitable step had been taken.