This man, with his persistence and insistence, annoyed Elizabeth almost beyond endurance; but the thing which troubled her most was the continual presenting of unpaid bills. She gave up her carriage and sold it with the horses, imagining in her simplicity that she could use this money for the payment of the accounts which rained upon her every day; and she actually did so use this money until informed by McBean that she had sold Pelham’s property and misused the proceeds. This McBean said to her one day in her own drawing–room, or what she supposed was her own drawing–room. Elizabeth’s heart fluttered with terror as McBean warned her that she would be required to account for every penny of this money—in fact of all the money that she was spending. She had that morning, in despair, taken her diamond and pearl necklace to a jeweller’s agent, who really acted as an amateur pawn–broker, and who had advanced her five hundred pounds on it. Had McBean asked her then about the necklace, she would have fainted on the floor; but he did not. As soon as he had gone, Elizabeth, in her widow’s dress, flew pale and panting to the agent to whom she had intrusted the necklace, and told him what McBean had said to her. The agent, who saw that he had a frightened woman in his power and a valuable piece of property worth four times what he had advanced on it, soothed Elizabeth by telling her that McBean had no right to demand the necklace from her, as it was hers, being partly her husband’s wedding gift to her. Elizabeth returned home, in that hour of darkness, with but one thought uppermost in her mind. Could she but see Pelham, he would not suffer her thus to be persecuted. She knew quite well how he would wish her to act,—to pay off the pressing debts which humiliated her, and to take the small balance of money left and remain in England until he should return. This she determined to do.