This was exactly the state of mind in which her father, Sir Philip, desired to find her. The far-seeing Baronet had some time ago set himself to the task of investigating the means and position of certain eligible bachelors among the aristocracy whom Stella was likely to meet in London. And among these, few had a fairer record in the matter of eligibility than Claud Edward Clayton Bromley, Viscount Carthew, heir to the Earl of Northborough. That horrible blot, the introduction of the gypsy Carewe element into the annals of the Cranstouns, might well be wiped out by such an alliance. Sir Philip’s keen eyes had noted what his daughter’s had totally failed to observe, the intensity of Lord Carthew’s regard as he turned toward Stella on his horse and drank in her words. As to what the girl’s sentiments in the matter were, that did not trouble Sir Philip for one moment. She had only been admitted into his household on suffrage, he told himself, a wretched infant, born in a hovel, and brought to his house by beggars. He did not know, so he argued, that she was even his wife’s child at all. When he said this, however, he lied, for the girl’s resemblance to her mother was very striking. In any case, it was not for her own sake, but to save her noble stepmother’s reason, that baby Stella was taken from her hiding-place in London and brought up in her father’s house. And a hundred times a day Sir Philip punished her for her lost mother’s pride and passionate temper. If she liked flowers and she planted them, orders were given for them to be uprooted and destroyed. A Miss Cranstoun must not soil her hands by gardening. No servant that she liked was allowed to be about her, and in her growing girlhood books that she seemed to enjoy were invariably taken away. These petty tyrannies Stella had endured for years in proud silence. It was as though she had been reserving her strength for some great struggle which was one day to take place, and to alter for all time the relations between herself and her father. For a long time she had felt it, as it were, hovering in the air, and that it would be upon the subject of her marriage she had no doubt. Only, she supposed that the trip to London would be the starting point for their quarrel, nor could she guess that this kindly new friend, who rode beside her and listened with such sympathetic interest to her little troubles, would be closely associated with the crucial conflict which was shortly to wage between herself and her father. CHAPTER VI. LORD CARTHEW’S WOOING. Mine host at the wayside inn, where the two young men had left their horses on the preceding day, was duly surprised and impressed by the appearance of one of his guests in company with no less a personage than Miss Cranstoun of the Chase.