is quite well; but I must have some advice from you respecting her.”
The words puzzled Jane. Lady Oakburn had written in evident anxiety; in—Jane thought—pain; certainly in haste. Her letters were always so sensible and self-possessed that there could be no doubt something unusual had seriously disturbed her, and that it concerned Lucy.
“I shall go,” decided Jane, as she folded the letter for the last time, and placed it in her pocket. “I do not like suspense, and I shall go to-day. We can get away by the three o’clock train.”
She rang for Judith, to give her the necessary orders, and in the same moment saw the carriage of her sister Laura stop at the gate. A grand carriage was Lady Laura’s now, with its bedecked servants and all sorts of show and frippery attached to it, quite after Laura’s own vain heart. Mr. Carlton the elder had quitted the world, and bequeathed his gains to his son; and none in all South Wennock were so grand as Mr. and Lady Laura Carlton.
She came in: the imperious look, which had now grown habitual, very conspicuous on her face; her robe of pale green morning silk rustling and glistening, her Chantilly veil of white flung back. Jane could see in a moment that something had crossed her. Something often did cross her now. The sisters were not very intimate. Jane maintained her original resolution, never to put her foot within Mr. Carlton’s house; and her intercourse with her sister was confined to these chance visits of Laura’s. Laura sat down upon the nearest chair, flinging her dainty parasol of lace upon the table.
“Jane, I wish to goodness you’d let me have Judith!”
The words were spoken without any superfluous ceremony of greeting. When Laura was put out, she was as sparing of courtesy as ever had been the sailor-earl, her father. Jane looked at her in surprise.
“Let you have Judith, Laura! I don’t know what you mean.”
“That Stiffing has nearly driven me wild this morning with her stupidity,” returned Lady Laura, alluding to her maid, “and if I could only get some one in her place to suit me, she should go this very day. Would you believe, Jane, would you believe, that she has gone and sent that lovely gold-coloured scarf of mine to the dyer’s?”
“She must have done it in a mistake,” observed Jane.
“But, good gracious, who but an idiot would make such a mistake?” retorted Laura. “I told her to send my brown scarf to be dyed, and she says she thought I meant my gold one, and she sent it, and it has come home this morning converted into a wretched thing of a black! I could have beaten her in my vexation. I wish you’d spare me Judith, Jane. She would suit me I know better than anybody else.”
Jane shook her head. Perhaps she admired the coolness of the request. She said very little; but that little was to the effect that she could not spare Judith, and Laura saw she meant it.
“Don’t part with a maid who suits you in other ways for one sole error, Laura,” was her advice. “At any rate, I cannot give you Judith. I am going to take her away with me this very day. I am going to Seaford.”
“To Seaford!” returned Laura, speaking as crossly as she felt. “Why, it was only on Friday, when I met you in High Street, you told me Lady Oakburn had invited you to Seaford, and you had declined to go.”
“I know I did. But I have had another letter from her this morning, and have altered my mind. I shall go to-day.”
Laura gave her head a toss in her old fashion. “I’d not be as changeable as you, Jane. Then you won’t give me Judith?”
“I am very sorry to deny you, Laura,” was Jane’s answer, “but I could not do without her.”
Laura sat tapping the carpet with her foot. “I have a great mind to go with you,” said she at length “I am sure Lady Oakburn would be glad to see me.”
“But 1 shall stay there a month.”
“What of that?”
“Mr. Carlton might not like to spare you for so long.”
“Do you suppose I study what he likes?” asked Laura, a scowl of bitter superciliousness crossing her face. “But I won’t go: I should miss the races here.”
For South Wennock was a gay place now, and held its own yearly races, at which nobody enjoyed themselves more than Lady Laura Carlton. These races brought to them some of the good county families, and Laura was in her element, keeping open house. She said a cold adieu to Jane; she was capricious as the wind; and swept out to her carriage with pouting lips.
From that one little remark above of my Lady Laura’s, the reader will infer that the domestic sunshine formerly brightening the daily life of Mr. Carlton and his wife, had not continued uninterruptedly to illumine it. Things might have been happier with Laura perhaps had she had children; but since that first infant which had died at its birth, there had