“Yes--to her solicitor’s office,” responded Perdita: then, after suffering him to manifest a sentiment of pique and annoyance for a few moments, she threw her arms around his neck, exclaiming, “And so you are very jealous, sir--are you?--and you thought perhaps that I was about to call upon this lawyer to signify to him my readiness to accept the hand of the old nobleman who is my mother’s relentless opponent in the suit? But I can assure you that the object of my visit in that quarter is one which you will no doubt highly approve. It is to inform the legal gentleman, with my own lips, that I utterly and totally decline the honour of the proposed union----” “Charming--dearest Perdita!” ejaculated Charles, straining her in rapture to his breast. “Inasmuch,” she added, with playful artlessness--or rather with an affectation of that delightful _naiveté_,--“inasmuch as the solicitor will not believe that I can possibly resist so splendid an offer; and he is determined to hear the truth from me--and from me only.” “And were he to over-persuade you, Perdita--to impress you with the necessity of yielding in this instance----” began Charles, still labouring under the vague apprehension with which the artful creature sought to inspire him in order to attach him the more completely to her. “Have you so much to fear on the part of an old nobleman whom I have never seen, as I have on the part of that beautiful Lady Frances who dwells beneath the same roof with you?” enquired Perdita, in the most melting tones of her flute-like voice. “Pardon me--pardon me, dearest girl!” cried Charles, embracing her fondly. “I have no more to pardon in you at present, than you had to forgive in me ere now,” murmured the guileful woman, placing her warm cheek against his own and allowing their hair to mingle. For a few moments she remained with him in this position,--a position that enchanted, thrilled, and intoxicated him: then suddenly withdrawing herself from his arms, she said, archly, but impressively, “It now remains with you, Charles, when our wedding-day is to be celebrated.” “Ah! if you were only as impatient as I!” he exclaimed. They parted--the young man hastening, as was his wont after these visits, to the park to feast his imagination with a delicious reverie the whole and sole subject of which should be Perdita! A few minutes after he had taken his departure, Mrs. Fitzhardinge sought her daughter in the drawing-room; and the ensuing dialogue took place. “Every thing tends to forward our designs with respect to this young man,” observed the old woman, seating herself in a chair opposite to her daughter, who was reclining upon the sofa. “And yet I cannot _now_ altogether comprehend your policy, mother,” returned Perdita. “In which particular point, my child?” demanded the vile parent.