“Yes, yes: I have no doubt,” said she, hurriedly; “but from your note--I have it here somewhere,” and she rummaged amongst a lot of papers that littered the table,--“your note gave me to understand that your visit to me regarded Mr. Thomas Lendrick, and not the Chief Baron. It is possible, however, I may have mistaken your meaning. I wish I could find it. I laid it out of my hand a moment ago. Oh, here it is! now we shall see which of us is right,” and with a sort of triumph she opened the letter and read aloud, slurring over the few commencing lines till she came to “that I may explain to your Ladyship the circumstances by which Mr. Thomas Lendrick's home will for the present be broken up, and entreat of you to extend to his daughter the same kind interest and favor you have so constantly extended to her father.” “Now, sir, I hope I may say that it is not _I_ have been mistaken. If I read this passage aright, it bespeaks my consideration for a young lady who will shortly need a home and a protectress.” “I suppose I expressed myself very ill. I mean, Madam, I take it, that in my endeavor not to employ any abruptness, I may have fallen into some obscurity. Shall I own, besides,” added he, with a tone of half-desperation in his voice, “that I had no fancy for this mission of mine at all,--that I undertook it wholly against my will? Baron Len-drick's broken health, my old friendship for him, his insistence,--and you can understand what _that_ is, eh?”--he thought she was about to speak; but she only gave a faint equivocal sort of smile, and he went on: “All these together overcame my scruples, and I agreed to come.” He paused here as though he had made the fullest and most ample explanation, and that it was now her turn to speak. “Well, sir,” said she, “go on; I am all ears for your communication.” “There it is: that 's the whole of it, Madam. You are to understand distinctly that with the arrangement itself I had no concern whatever. Baron Lendrick never asked my advice; I never tendered it. I 'm not sure that I should have concurred with his notions,--but that 's nothing to the purpose; all that I consented to was to come here, to tell you the thing is so, and why it is so--there!” and with this he wiped his forehead, for the exertion had heated and fatigued him. “I know I 'm very dull, very slow of comprehension; and in compassion for this defect, will you kindly make your explanation a little, a very little, fuller? What is it that is _so?_” and she emphasized the last word with a marked sarcasm in her tone. “Oh, I can see that your Ladyship may not quite like it. There is no reason why you should like it,--all things considered; but, after all, it may turn out very well. If she suit him, if she can hit it off with his temper,--and she may,--young folks have often more forbearance than older ones,--there 's no saying what it may lead to.”