They left the Lodore Hotel in an open carriage, after luncheon next day, and posted to Fellside, where they arrived just in time to assist at Lady Maulevrier's afternoon tea. She received them both with warm affection, and made Hartfield sit close beside her sofa; and every now and then, in the pauses of their talk, she laid her wasted and too delicate fingers upon the young man's strong brown hand, with a caressing gesture. 'You can never know how sweet it is to me to be able to love you,' she said tenderly. 'You can never know how my heart yearned to you from the very first, and how hard it was to keep myself in check and not be too kind to you. Oh, Hartfield, you should have told me the truth. You should not have come here under false colours.' 'Should I not, Lady Maulevrier? It was my only chance of being loved for my own sake; or, at least of knowing that I was so loved. If I had come with my rank and my fortune in my hand, as it were--one of the good matches of the year--what security could I ever have felt in the disinterested love of the girl who chose me? As plain John Hammond I wooed and was rejected; as plain John Hammond I wooed and won; and the prize which I so won is a pearl above price. Not for worlds, were the last year to be lived over again, would I have one day of my life altered.' 'Well, I suppose I ought to be satisfied. I wanted you for Lesbia, and I have got you for Mary. Best of all, I have got you for myself. Ronald Hollister's son is mine; he is of my kin; he belongs to me; he will not forsake me in life; he will be near me, God grant, when I die.' 'Dear Lady Maulevrier, as far as in me lies, I will be to you as a son,' said Lord Hartfield, very solemnly, stooping to kiss her hand. Mary came away from her tea-table to embrace her grandmother. 'It makes me so happy to have won a little of your regard,' she murmured, 'and to know that I have married a man whom you can love.' 'Of course you have heard of Lesbia's engagement?' Lady Maulevrier said presently, when they were taking their tea. 'Maulevrier wrote to us about it.' 'To us.' How nice it sounded, thought Mary, as if they were a firm, and a letter written to one was written to both. 'And do you know this Mr. Smithson?' 'Not intimately. I have met him at the Carlton.' 'I am told that he is very much esteemed by your party, and that he is very likely to get a peerage when this Ministry goes out of office.' 'That is not improbable. Peerages are to be had if a man is rich enough; and Smithson is supposed to be inordinately rich.' 'I hope he has character as well as money,' said Lady Maulevrier, gravely. 'But do you think a man can become inordinately rich in a short time, with unblemished honour?'