She drew back into her room and, after another interval of thought, unfastened the clasps of her clothes and let them slip down to her feet; she had already loosened the coils of her hair, and now, by a shake of her head, her white shoulders and the exquisite full curves of roseate flesh were deluged with a thousand little cascades flowing and overflowing with the unevenness of a torrent on which a fitful moon is shining. She began her task of brushing, and went on with it for five minutes until her arms began to ache. Then she wove her plaits, and in crossing the room to get her nightdress she caught a glimpse of her figure passing the tall looking-glass. The glimpse did not interest her in the least. She did not cast a second glance at the glass. She slipped her nightdress over her head, blew out her candles, and went into bed. No, she was not in the least in love with the man of whom she had been thinking. CHAPTER X The news that young Mr. Wingfield had come not only into possession of the property which he had inherited, after the interval made compulsory by the will, but into residence at the Manor House as well, did not take long to spread round Framsby. Framsby was ready to receive him to her great motherly heart. The fact of his being a prodigal did not interfere in the least with the warmth of the maternal embrace which Framsby was preparing for him; nay, it actually increased the enthusiasm with which the sentiment of his coming was hailed. Is it not well known that the prodigal son is the nearest to the mother’s heart of all her family? Now, nothing was known of the details of Jack Wingfield’s prodigality; but the terms of his grandfather’s will had assumed that his prodigality would be a matter of course, and all Framsby were ready to stand by the inference of so interesting a legal document. If there was any doubt in the matter, they were quite ready to give him the benefit of it by assuming that the piquancy of prodigality was attached to him. He would make the money fly, no fear! was the prediction of the men who winked at one another in the evening over the pewter measures of the “Field and Furrow”; and the tradesmen of Framsby hoped with all their heart and soul that he would. A prodigal during the first few years of his career is the idol of the tradesmen; later on they think of Jeroboam the son of Nebat first, and of the fate that befell his house, and of Pharaoh the monarch of Egypt afterwards. They turn away from the worship of idols and harden their hearts at the suggestion of credit.