from the heights, and the contact with mother earth was hard. Lucy felt ashamed of herself that this should be, but she could not help it. It was all so different. Was it possible that the “Aunty Ford” of old was like this? Mrs. Ford was still wearing her mourning. She had crape flowers upon her bonnet, awful counterfeits of nature, corn flowers with stamens of prickly jet. Her shawl was huddled up about her neck, she had taken off her black gloves, as it was so warm, and her face was of a fine crimson. As for Ford, on the contrary, he was neatness itself. He wore a little checked tie very stiffly starched, and his waistcoat, and the thin legs which were so prominent, were of checked black and white in a large pattern. Mourning is not so necessary for a man as for a woman. Mrs. Ford’s crape flowers, with which her bonnet bristled, were intended for the highest respect. Lucy’s depressed sensations were enlivened by a wondering doubt whether she could prevail upon the good woman to abandon these unearthly flowers. Mrs. Ford was talking all the way. “Did you see those Rushtons,” she said, “making a dead set at Lucy the very first moment? one would have thought they would have had more pride, and that Raymond, that son of theirs! as if Lucy, with the best in London at her feet, would look twice at a Raymond? Oh, yes, you’ll see, they’ll be all down upon you like locusts, Lucy; not a young man in the town that won’t be thrown at your head. It is your money they’re after--only your money. What is that carriage following behind us? It is coming here, I declare; it’s somebody that has got scent of you already--that’s what it is to be an heiress; but it can’t be so bad as what you’ve gone through in London.” “It is only Elizabeth,” said Lucy; “Oh, how like Sir Tom! he has put her in the carriage; Elizabeth--that is my maid. Would you rather I had not brought a maid, Aunt Ford?” “A maid-- I never see the use of them. You could have had Jane to help you when you wanted any extra dressing,” said Mrs. Ford, with gloom on her countenance. “What did I tell you, Ford? I said Lady Randolph would be sending some spy to keep a watch upon us. Do you call that a maid? sitting up as grand as possible in the carriage, as if she were the lady and you the servant. It’s like Sir Tom, is it? I don’t doubt but it’s like Sir Tom, _he’s_ well enough known about here. He’s not one you should ever have spoken to, or sat down in the same room with him, if my consent had been asked. Many’s the story I could tell about Sir Tom, as you call him; oh, I don’t doubt it’s quite like him! and many a one he has ruined with his smiling ways.”