“'We are on our way to England, to Ireland, perhaps,' he said to me, in a careless way; but she, not aware of his speech, told me they had been invited to the Priory,--a piece of information which I own startled me. First of all, they are not by any means like people who would be agreeable to my father, nor, so far as I can guess, are they persons who would easily sacrifice their own modes of life and habits to the wishes of a recluse. Least of all, dearest Lucy, do I desire this lady to be your companion. She has, I see, many attractive qualities; she may have others as good and excellent; but if I do not greatly err, her whole nature and being are in subjection to a very stern, cold, and unscrupulous man, and she is far from being all that she should be with such gifts as she possesses, and farther again from what she might have been with a happier destiny in marriage. “If it were not that you are so certain to meet, and not improbably see much of these people, I should not have filled so much of my letter with them; but I confess to you, since I saw them they have never been out of my thoughts. Our relationship--if that be the name for it--led us rapidly into considerable intimacy; he brought his children--two lovely girls, and a little cherub of a boy of three years old--to see me yesterday, and Mrs. Sewell comes to take me to drive every day after luncheon. She expresses the most ardent desire to meet you, and says she knows you will love each other. She carried off your picture t' other day, and I was in real terror till I got it back again. She seemed in ecstasy on being told you were living with your grandfather; but I saw a look she shot across to her husband as I told it, and I saw his reply by another glance that revealed to me how my tidings had caused surprise, and something more than surprise. “You must not set me down as fanciful or captious, dear Lucy; but the simple truth is, I have never had a quiet moment since I knew these people. They inspire me with the same sort of anxiety I have often felt when, in the course of my profession, some symptom has supervened in a case not very grave or startling in itself, but still such as I have always found heralding in very serious combinations. It is therefore the doctor as much as the father that takes alarm here. “It is just possible--mind, I say possible--that I am a little jealous of these Sewells, for they have already seduced from me my young friend Lionel, who was so kind to me on the voyage. I scarcely see him now, he is always with them; and yesterday I heard--it may not be true--that he is already weary of Cape Town, and means to return home by the next ship,--that is, along with the Sewells, who are to sail on Friday. “I am certain that Sewell is neither a good nor a safe companion for a young fellow so bashful and unsuspecting as Lionel Trafford.