So one of the closing scenes of a sudden tragedy had been acted in that fine old English manor-house, standing amid its richly-wooded chase, the undulating sward of which was of such a brilliant emerald that it reminded those who saw it that Hurdell Hall stood in the most fertile part of Hampshire. When Sir Harry invited Sir Paget to visit him and join him in the fatal--as it eventually proved--cub-hunting, his object had been a nefarious one, but quite adapted to the tone of a _blasé_ man about town like himself, the hope of engaging the beautiful young wife of his elderly club friend in a very decided case of flirtation--so ignorant was he of Eveline's character, and how her ill-assorted marriage was brought about. Now he hoped by a more honourable course to secure both her purse and person. By will, however, it was soon known that Sir Paget, to prevent a younger successor enjoying any of his pelf through her, had stripped her of everything but what he had been compelled to settle upon her for life. However, Sir Harry thought she was every way a most desirable widow to win, but her sorrow and sadness were a sore worry to Lucretia. 'Don't weep, dear,' she would say, in that hard, sharp tone peculiar to some selfish women. 'It is the worst possible thing for one's eyes in every way.' And, sooth to say, Miss Hurdell's cold, steely orbs did not seem even to have been much afflicted with the weakness of weeping. 'Ah--we all have our trials, dear Lady Puddicombe,' she resumed, after a pause. 'Do try to bear this patiently, and believe it all for--all for----' 'All for what?' 'Well--the best.' 'The best--how, Miss Hurdell?' 'Well--he was so old and you so young, don't you see,' replied this very matter-of-fact person. Free--for whom and to what extent? Eveline never viewed the dispensation of Providence thus; but till Olive came with her soothing presence, every night amid the darkness of her room, the pent-up tempest in her bosom--the tempest of unavailing regrets--would burst forth with loud whispers and sobs till sleep came, as it always did, at last. Before Olive arrived, Lucretia was ever by the bed-side of her 'sweet Eveline,' sitting for hours together, putting Eau-de-Cologne on her handkerchiefs and Rimmel on her temples, arranging her pillow or her footstool if she left her couch for a chair, telling her stories of foreign life at Naples, Homburg, and Monaco, and so forth, for she believed that Eveline had been left with a splendid jointure, and a Scottish estate by a former lover; while Sir Harry lounged about impatiently in the stables and kennels, with his briar-root, and thinking 'when will all this end? And _how_ can she go on as she does about that old pump?'