Madame de Coulancourt, grateful to Providence for her preservation from so many perils, selected a handsome mansion in Paris for residence, where she looked forward with hope to peace to restore her daughter to her; her son she firmly believed to have been beheaded. Some months after Jean Plessis obtained his liberty, and soon learned by diligent inquiries the fate of Madame de Coulancourt, and at once set out for Paris, thus relieving Madame de Coulancourt’s mind from great anxiety on his and his family’s account, for she feared he had perished in attempting her deliverance. CHAPTER XVI. Five years have passed since Mabel Arden was placed under the care of Mrs. Sampson; and she was now seventeen years of age. For the last six months she had quitted school, and remained under the care and protection of Madame Volney, who, with her daughter Agatha, resided in a pretty villa in the immediate vicinity of Southampton. Madame Volney’s income was five hundred a-year, having placed the large sum of money she had had bequeathed to her in the hands of Mr. Stanmore, who had invested it for her very advantageously. The thousand pounds so generously left by Lieutenant O’Loughlin and our hero for Mabel’s benefit Mr. Stanmore also placed out at interest; and what the interest lacked in amount to discharge the expense of her schooling, the solicitor paid himself, so that the little capital remained untouched, Mr. Stanmore feeling satisfied that Mabel would in the end be able to establish her rights, and recover interest and principal out of the Etherton estates; but as to forcing Sir Godfrey to acknowledge his niece without certain proofs of her birth, &c., was out of the question. About two years after the placing of Mabel at school, Sir Godfrey Etherton became somewhat embarrassed, through the imprudence of his son-in-law, Lord Coldburgh and Philip Etherton, who were fast friends, the former having induced his brother-in-law to join him in a security for fourteen thousand pounds—racing debts—which his lordship declared were to be paid for out of the proceeds of an estate in Dorsetshire, to be sold immediately. Unfortunately his lordship’s creditors, thinking he lived much too fast, brought matters to a close, and laid hands on all the property, politely requesting Mr. Philip Etherton to take up the bond for fourteen thousand pounds.