His soft and gentle face set into a harsh rigidity: it grew stern, almost severe. “Come indoors, mother--the evening gets cold,” he added, after a pause. “Just a word, Richard--just one word! Do you not see a trace of something different rising in her? She has brought back your boy: I suppose she thinks, poor thing, that it is just she should have one of them----” “Mother,” said Richard, “I am astonished at your charity. You say, poor thing. Do you remember that she has ruined your son’s life?” Lady Eskside made no answer. She looked at him wistfully, with an evident repression of something that rose to her lips. “She has been my curse,” said Richard, vehemently. “For God’s sake, if she will leave us alone, let us leave her alone. She has made my life a desert. Is it choice, do you think, that makes me an outcast from my own country? that shuts me out from everything your son and my father’s son ought to have been? Why cannot I take my proper place in society--my natural place? You know well enough what the answer is--she is the cause. She has been my ruin: she is the curse of my life.” He spoke almost with passion, growing not red but white in the intensity of his feelings. Lady Eskside looked at him, kept looking at him, with a face in which sympathy shone--along with some other expression not so easy to be defined. “Richard,” she said, in a low voice, “all you say is true--who can know it better than I do? but oh, my dear, mind! she could have had no power on your life, if you had not given it to her--of your free will.” “So, then, it is I alone who am to blame?” said Richard, with a laugh, which was half rage and half scorn. “I might have known that was what you were sure to say.” “Yes, you might have known it,” said Lady Eskside--“for nothing, I hope, will ever shut my mind to justice; but not because I am in the habit of reproaching you, Richard--for that I never did, even when you had made my heart sore; but we need not quarrel about it, you and me. What I want to know is, if you do not see now the still greater importance of getting some hold upon her--for Valentine’s--for all our sakes?” “You will never get a hold upon her: it is folly to dream of it. She is beyond your reach, or that of any reasonable creature. Mother, come in--the bell must have rung for dinner.” “I have written to the man we employed before,” said Lady Eskside, hurriedly. “This was what I wanted to say. Do not stare at me, Richard! I will not put up with it. I must do my duty as I see it, and whatever comes of it. I have given him all the particulars I could, and told him to try every means, and lose no time. Her heart must be soft after giving up her child.” “So,” said Richard, with a quivering pale smile, “you consult me what should be done after all the steps have been taken. This is kind! You have taken care to provide for my domestic comfort, mother--”