The shock and surprise sent Mrs. Carlyon into Norfolk. She gave orders to her maid, Higson, to prepare for their instant departure. "And it is just as well that I should go on another score," she told herself, as she stepped into her carriage to be driven to the station: "to ascertain whether my niece has relinquished that most absurd idea of hers--that she is not her Uncle Gilbert's legal inheritor. What a ridiculous world we live in!" So, at a late hour that same evening, Mrs. Carlyon, with her maid, arrived at Heron Dyke--without any notice. "Your letter, Ella, took my breath away," she began, hardly allowing herself a moment for greetings. "Has this engagement which you tell me of really gone so far that it cannot be broken off?" "But who wants it to be broken off, Aunt Gertrude?" returned Ella. "What! Consider, my dear--a newspaper reporter, for Mr. Conroy is neither more nor less than that. A very nice gentlemanly young man, I admit, and one who has made himself a name in a certain way, but scarcely a match for the heiress of Heron Dyke." "I am not going to marry for ambition, aunt, but for--for----" "Love, I conclude you would say. Love may be all very well in its way, but why not have combined the two? Your husband ought to be at least your equal in position. With your fortune and good looks, you might have aspired to marry into the peerage; at the very least, you ought to have a husband with a seat in Parliament. I am very much disappointed," concluded Mrs. Carlyon, sitting down on the nearest chair. "I am sorry for that, aunt; and so will Mr. Conroy be." "My dear! Surely you will not be so foolish as to tell him," cried Mrs. Carlyon, hastily. "What I say to you is strictly between ourselves. I like Mr. Conroy very well--I like him so well that I should not care to hurt his feelings, although he has ambitiously cast his eyes on you." "I am afraid, aunt, he could not help liking me. He said so." "I dare say! Well, perhaps that may be true. If he were but well-connected--or a landed proprietor, say--or even a rising man in the law courts--or, in short, almost anything but a newspaper reporter, there is no one I would sooner see you marry. But as he is----" "I am quite satisfied with him as he is, Aunt Gertrude. And you must please remember," added Ella, with a quaint little smile, "that it was at your house I first met him. Don't you remember with what _empressement_ you introduced him to me? He was quite the lion of the evening: you made him so: still, of course, as you say, he was only a newspaper reporter." Mrs. Carlyon fidgeted in her chair. "One may be gratified to receive a person as a visitor," she said, "but it does not follow that one cares to make him a member of one's family. As to that evening, I have hated to think of it ever since, for it was when my jewels were stolen, and now I shall hate it still more. But, to return to the point, you, the mistress of Heron Dyke----"