"Ah, is there?" he said, shrinking a little from the look and the tone. "I thought you wanted me to meet them all." "I do; but there is one in particular. It is a lady, Clive," she said, giving him a significant smile that he thought hideous. He tried gently to wrench himself away from her. "Well, I must go and take my siesta and dress before I meet them," he said. "Wait a minute, Clive. I must speak to you," she said, in a tone that savored of authority. "Will not some other time do as well?" he inquired, glancing rather ungallantly at his watch. "No time like the present," she answered, resolutely. "You are trying to put me off again, Clive; but beware how you trifle with me, my Lord Lancaster, or I shall know how to punish you," she said, shaking her skinny, diamond-ringed finger at him. His handsome face flushed haughtily. "Go on, madame," he said, with a slight, mocking bow. "I am the slave of your pleasure." She regarded the handsome, insubordinate face in dead silence a minute. "You already anticipate what I would say," she said. "Why is the idea so distasteful to you, Clive? Any young man in your position might be transported with joy at the thought of inheriting my fortune." He bowed silently. "You know," she went on, coolly, "you can never come home to live on your ancestral acres unless you marry money or inherit it." "Thanks to the folly of my predecessors," he said, bitterly. "Never mind your predecessors, Clive. There is a woman here whom I want you to marry. Win her and make her mistress of Lancaster Park, and my fortune is yours." "Am I to have her for the asking?" he inquired, with a delicate sarcasm. "It is very likely you may," she answered. "Handsome faces like yours make fools of most women." "And who is the lady it is to charm in this case?" he inquired, with bitter brevity. "It is the Lady Adela Eastwood," she replied, concisely. He gave a low whistle of incredulity. "The Lady Adela Eastwood--the daughter of a hundred earls!" he cried. "Your ambition soars high, Aunt Lydia." "Not too high," she replied, shaking her old head proudly, until the great red jewels in her ears flashed like drops of blood. CHAPTER XX. "Not too high," repeated Lady Lancaster, sagely. "The lords of Lancaster have married earls' daughters before to-day." "Yes, in their palmy days," said Clive Lancaster; "but not now, when their patrimony is wasted, their lands encumbered with taxes, and their last descendant earning a paltry living in her majesty's service." "Lady Adela is as poor as you are," said the withered old woman, significantly. "No?" "Yes." "But I thought that the Earl of Eastwood was very rich." "He was once; but he and his spendthrift sons have made ducks and drakes of the money at the gaming-table. Lady Adela will have no portion at all. She will be compelled to marry a fortune." "So you have placed yours at her disposal?" he said, with hardly repressed scorn.