SIR PATRICK found his sister-in-law immersed in domesticbusiness. Her ladyship's correspondence and visiting list, herladyship's household bills and ledgers; her ladyship's Diary andMemorandum-book (bound in scarlet morocco); her ladyship's desk,envelope-case, match-box, and taper candlestick (all in ebony andsilver); her ladyship herself, presiding over herresponsibilities, and wielding her materials, equal to any callsof emergency, beautifully dressed in correct morning costume,blessed with perfect health both of the secretions and theprinciples; absolutely void of vice, and formidably full ofvirtue, presented, to every properly-constituted mind, the mostimposing spectacle known to humanity--the British Matron on herthrone, asking the world in general, When will you produce thelike of Me?

"I am afraid I disturb you," said Sir Patrick. "I am a perfectlyidle person. Shall I look in a little later?"

Lady Lundie put her hand to her head, and smiled faintly.

"A little pressure _here,_ Sir Patrick. Pray sit down. Duty findsme earnest; Duty finds me cheerful; Duty finds me accessible.From a poor, weak woman, Duty must expect no more. Now what isit?" (Her ladyship consulted her scarlet memorandum-book.) "Ihave got it here, under its proper head, distinguished by initialletters. P.--the. poor. No. H.M.--heathen missions. No.V.T.A.--Visitors to arrive. No. P. I. P.--Here it is: privateinterview with Patrick. Will you forgive me the little harmlessfamiliari ty of omitting your title? Thank you! You are always sogood. I am quite at your service when you like to begin. If it'sany thing painful, pray don't hesitate. I am quite prepared."

With that intimation her ladyship threw herself back in herchair, with her elbows on the arms, and her fingers joined at thetips, as if she was receiving a deputation. "Yes?" she said,interrogatively. Sir Patrick paid a private tribute of pity tohis late brother's memory, and entered on his business.

"We won't call it a painful matter," he began. "Let us say it's amatter of domestic anxiety. Blanche--"

Lady Lundie emitted a faint scream, and put her hand over hereyes.

"_Must_ you?" cried her ladyship, in a tone of touchingremonstrance. "Oh, Sir Patrick, _must_ you?"

"Yes. I must."

Lady Lundie's magnificent eyes looked up at that hidden court ofhuman appeal which is lodged in the ceiling. The hidden courtlooked down at Lady Lundie, and saw--Duty advertising itself inthe largest capital letters.

"Go on, Sir Patrick. The motto of woman is Self-sacrifice. Yousha'n't see how you distress me. Go on."

Sir Patrick went on impenetrably--without betraying the slightestexpression of sympathy or surprise.

"I was about to refer to the nervous attack from which Blanchehas suffered this morning," he said. "May I ask whether you havebeen informed of the cause to which the attack is attributable?"

"There!" exclaimed Lady Lundie with a sudden bound in her chair,and a sudden development of vocal power to correspond. "The onething I shrank from speaking of! the cruel, cruel, cruel behaviorI was prepared to pass over! And Sir Patrick hints on it!Innocently--don't let me do an injustice--innocently hints onit!"

"Hints on what, my dear Madam?"

"Blanche's conduct to me this morning. Blanche's heartlesssecrecy. Blanche's undutiful silence. I repeat the words:Heartless secrecy. Undutiful silence."

"Allow me for one moment, Lady Lundie--"

"Allow _me,_ Sir Patrick! Heaven knows how unwilling I am tospeak of it. Heaven knows that not a word of reference to itescaped _my_ lips. But you leave me no choice now. As mistress ofthe household, as a Christian woman, as the widow of your dearbrother, as a mother to this misguided girl, I must state thefacts. I know you mean well; I know you wish to spare me. Quiteuseless! I must state the facts."

Sir Patrick bowed, and submitted. (If he had only been abricklayer! and if Lady Lundie had not been, what her ladyshipunquestionably was, the strongest person of the two!)

"Permit me to draw a veil, for your sake," said Lady Lundie,"over the horrors--I can not, with the best wish to spare you,conscientiously call them by any other name--the horrors thattook place up stairs. The moment I heard that Blanche was ill Iwas at my post. Duty will always find me ready, Sir Patrick, tomy dying day. Shocking as the whole thing was, I presided calmlyover the screams and sobs of my step-daughter. I closed my earsto the profane violence of her language. I set the necessaryexample, as an English gentlewoman at the head of her household.It was only when I distinctly heard the name of a person, neverto be mentioned again in my family circle, issue (if I may usethe expression) from Blanche's lips that I began to be reallyalarmed. I said to my maid: 'Hopkins, this is not Hysteria. Thisis a possession of the devil. Fetch the chloroform.' "

Chloroform, applied in the capacity of an exorcism, was entirelynew to Sir Patrick. He preserved his gravity with considerabledifficulty. Lady Lundie went on:

"Hopkins is an excellent person--but Hopkins has a tongue. Shemet our distinguished medical guest in the corridor, and toldhim. He was so good as to come to the door. I was shocked totrouble him to act in his professional capacity while he was avisitor, an honored visitor, in my house. Besides, I consideredit more a case for a clergyman than for a medical man. However,there was no help for it after Hopkins's tongue. I requested oureminent friend to favor us with--I think the exact scientificterm is--a Prognosis. He took the purely material view which wasonly to be expected from a person in his profession. Heprognosed--_am_ I right? Did he prognose? or did he diagnose? Ahabit of speaking correctly is _so_ important, Sir Patrick! and Ishould be _so_ grieved to mislead you!"

"Never mind, Lady Lundie! I have heard the medical report. Don'ttrouble yourself to repeat it."

"Don't trouble myself to repeat it?" echoed Lady Lundie--with herdignity up in arms at the bare prospect of finding her remarksabridged. "Ah, Sir Patrick! that little constitutional impatienceof yours!--Oh, dear me! how often you must have given way to it,and how often you must have regretted it, in your time!"

"My dear lady! if you wish to repeat the report, why not say so,in plain words? Don't let me hurry you. Let us have theprognosis, by all means."

Lady Lundie shook her head compassionately, and smiled withangelic sadness. "Our little besetting sins!" she said. "Whatslaves we are to our little besetting sins! Take a turn in theroom--do!"

Any ordinary man would have lost his temper. But the law (as SirPatrick had told his niece) has a special temper of its own.Without exhibiting the smallest irritation, Sir Patrickdextrously applied his sister-in-law's blister to hissister-in-law herself.

"What an eye you have!" he said. "I was impatient. I _am_impatient. I am dying to know what Blanche said to you when shegot better?"

The British Matron froze up into a matron of stone on the spot.

"Nothing!" answered her ladyship, with a vicious snap of herteeth, as if she had tried to bite the word before it escapedher.

"Nothing!" exclaimed Sir Patrick.

"Nothing," repeated Lady Lundie, with her most formidableemphasis of look and tone. "I applied all the remedies with myown hands; I cut her laces with my own scissors, I completelywetted her head through with cold water; I remained with heruntil she was quite exhausted- I took her in my arms, and foldedher to my bosom; I sent every body out of the room; I said, 'Dearchild, confide in me.' And how were my advances--my motherlyadvances--met? I have already told you. By heartless secrecy. Byundutiful silence."

Sir Patrick pressed the blister a little closer to the skin. "Shewas probably afraid to speak," he said.

"Afraid? Oh!" cried Lady Lundie, distrusting the evidence of herown senses. "You can't have said that? I have evidentlymisapprehended you. You didn't really say, afraid?"

"I said she was probably afraid--"

"Stop! I can't be told to my face that I have failed to do myduty by Blanche. No, Sir Patrick! I can bear a great deal; but Ican't bear that. After having been more than a mother to yourdear brother's child; after having been an elder sister toBlanche; after having toiled--I say _toiled,_ Sir Patrick!--tocultivate her intelligence (with the sweet lines of the poet everpresent to my memory: 'Delightful task to rear the tender mind,and teach the young idea how to shoot!'); after having done all Ihave done--a place in the carriage only yesterday, and a visit tothe most interesting relic of feudal times in Perthshire--afterhaving sacrificed all I have sacrificed, to be told that I havebehaved in such a manner to Blanche as to frighten her when I askher to confide in me, is a little too cruel. I have asensitive--an unduly sensitive nature, dear Sir Patrick. Forgiveme for wincing when I am wounded. Forgive me for feeling it whenthe wound is dealt me by a person whom I revere."

Her ladyship put her handkerchief to her eyes. Any other manwould have taken off the blister. Sir Patrick pressed it harderthan ever.

"You quite mistake me," he replied. "I meant that Blanche wasafraid to tell you the true cause of her illness. The true causeis anxiety about Miss Silvester."

Lady Lundie emitted another scream--a loud scream this time--andclosed her eyes in horror.

"I can run out of the house," cried her ladyship, wildly. "I canfly to the uttermost corners of the earth; but I can _not_ hearthat person's name mentioned! No, Sir Patrick! not in my presence! not in my room! not while I am mistress at WindygatesHouse!"

"I am sorry to say any thing that is disagreeable to you, LadyLundie. But the nature of my errand here obliges me to touch--aslightly as possible--on something which has happened in yourhouse without your knowledge."

Lady Lundie suddenly opened her eyes, and became the picture ofattention. A casual observer might have supposed her ladyship tobe not wholly inaccessible to the vulgar emotion of curiosity.

"A visitor came to Windygates yesterday, while we were all atlunch," proceeded Sir Patrick. "She--"

Lady Lundie seized the scarlet memorandum-book, and stopped herbrother-in-law, before he could get any further. Her ladyship'snext words escaped her lips spasmodically, like words let atintervals out of a trap.

"I undertake--as a woman accustomed to self-restraint, SirPatrick--I undertake to control myself, on one condition. I won'thave the name mentioned. I won't have the sex mentioned. Say,'The Person,' if you please. 'The Person,' " continued LadyLundie, opening her memorandum-book and taking up her pen,"committed an audacious invasion of my premises yesterday?"

Sir Patrick bowed. Her ladyship made a note--a fiercely-pennednote that scratched the paper viciously--and then proceeded toexamine her brother-in-law, in the capacity of witness.

"What part of my house did 'The Person' invade? Be very careful,Sir Patrick! I propose to place myself under the protection of ajustice of the peace; and this is a memorandum of my statement.The library--did I understand you to say? Just so--the library."

"Add," said Sir Patrick, with another pressure on the blister,"that The Person had an interview with Blanche in the library."

Lady Lundie's pen suddenly stuck in the paper, and scattered alittle shower of ink-drops all round it. "The library," repeatedher ladyship, in a voice suggestive of approaching suffocation."I undertake to control myself, Sir Patrick! Any thing missingfrom the library?"

"Nothing missing, Lady Lundie, but The Person herself. She--"

"No, Sir Patrick! I won't have it! In the name of my own sex, Iwon't have it!"

"Pray pardon me--I forgot that 'she' was a prohibited pronoun onthe present occasion. The Person has written a farewell letter toBlanche, and has gone nobody knows where. The distress producedby these events is alone answerable for what has happened toBlanche this morning. If you bear that in mind--and if youremember what your own opinion is of Miss Silvester--you willunderstand why Blanche hesitated to admit you into herconfidence."

There he waited for a reply. Lady Lundie was too deeply absorbedin completing her memorandum to be conscious of his presence inthe room.

" 'Carriage to be at the door at two-thirty,' " said Lady Lundie,repeating the final words of the memorandum while she wrote them." 'Inquire for the nearest justice of the peace, and place theprivacy of Windygates under the protection of the law.'--I begyour pardon!" exclaimed her ladyship, becoming conscious again ofSir Patrick's presence. "Have I missed any thing particularlypainful? Pray mention it if I have!"

"You have missed nothing of the slightest importance," returnedSir Patrick. "I have placed you in possession of facts which youhad a right to know; and we have now only to return to ourmedical friend's report on Blanche's health. You were about tofavor me, I think, with the Prognosis?"

"Diagnosis!" said her ladyship, spitefully. "I had forgotten atthe time--I remember now. Prognosis is entirely wrong."

"I sit corrected, Lady Lundie. Diagnosis."

"You have informed me, Sir Patrick, that you were alreadyacquainted with the Diagnosis. It is quite needless for me torepeat it now."

"I was anxious to correct my own impression, my dear lady, bycomparing it with yours."

"You are very good. You are a learned man. I am only a poorignorant woman. Your impression can not possibly requirecorrecting by mine."

"My impression, Lady Lundie, was that our so friend recommendedmoral, rather than medical, treatment for Blanche. If we can turnher thoughts from the painful subject on which they are nowdwelling, we shall do all that is needful. Those were his ownwords, as I remember them. Do you confirm me?"

"Can _I_ presume to dispute with you, Sir Patrick? You are amaster of refined irony, I know. I am afraid it's all thrown awayon poor me."

(The law kept its wonderful temper! The law met the mostexasperating of living women with a counter-power of defensiveaggravation all its own!)

"I take that as confirming me, Lady Lundie. Thank you. Now, as tothe method of carrying out our friend's advice. The method seemsplain. All we can do to divert Blanche's mind is to turnBlanche's attention to some other subject of reflection lesspainful than the subject which occupies her now. Do you agree, sofar?"

"Why place the whole responsibility on my shoulders?" inquiredLady Lundie.

"Out of profound deference for your opinion," answered SirPatrick. "Strictly speaking, no doubt, any serious responsibilityrests with me. I am Blanche's guardian--"

"Thank God!" cried Lady Lundie, with a perfect explosion of piousfervor.

"I hear an outburst of devout thankfulness," remarked SirPatrick. "Am I to take it as expressing--let me say--some littledoubt, on your part, as to the prospect of managing Blanchesuccessfully, under present circumstances?"

Lady Lundie's temper began to give way again--exactly as herbrother-in-law had anticipated.

"You are to take it," she said, "as expressing my conviction thatI saddled myself with the charge of an incorrigibly heartless,obstinate and perverse girl, when I undertook the care ofBlanche."

"Did you say 'incorrigibly?' "

"I said 'incorrigibly.' "

"If the case is as hopeless as that, my dear Madam--as Blanche'sguardian, I ought to find means to relieve you of the charge ofBlanche."

"Nobody shall relieve _me_ of a duty that I have onceundertaken!" retorted Lady Lundie. "Not if I die at my post!"

"Suppose it was consistent with your duty," pleaded Sir Patrick,"to be relieved at your post? Suppose it was in harmony with that'self-sacrifice' which is 'the motto of women?' "

"I don't understand you, Sir Patrick. Be so good as to explainyourself."

Sir Patrick assumed a new character--the character of ahesitating man. He cast a look of respectful inquiry at hissister-in-law, sighed, and shook his head.

"No!" he said. "It would be asking too much. Even with your highstandard of duty, it would be asking too much."

"Nothing which you can ask me in the name of duty is too much."

"No! no! Let me remind you. Human nature has its limits."

"A Christian gentlewoman's sense of duty knows no limits."

"Oh, surely yes!"

"Sir Patrick! after what I have just said your perseverance indoubting me amounts to something like an insult!"

"Don't say that! Let me put a case. Let's suppose the futureinterests of another person depend on your saying, Yes--when allyour own most cherished ideas and opinions urge you to say, No.Do you really mean to tell me that you could trample your ownconvictions under foot, if it could be shown that the purelyabstract consideration of duty was involved in the sacrifice?"

"Yes!" cried Lady Lundie, mounting the pedestal of her virtue onthe spot. "Yes--without a moment's hesitation!"

"I sit corrected, Lady Lundie. You embolden me to proceed. Allowme to ask (after what I just heard)--whether it is not your dutyto act on advice given for Blanche's benefit, by one the highestmedical authorities in England?" Her ladyship admitted that itwas her duty; pending a more favorable opportunity forcontradicting her brother-in-law.

"Very good," pursued Sir Patrick. "Assuming that Blanche is likemost other human beings, and has some prospect of happiness tocontemplate, if she could only be made to see it--are we notbound to make her see it, by our moral obligation to act on themedical advice?" He cast a courteously-persuasive look at herladyship, and paused in the most innocent manner for a reply.

If Lady Lundie had not been bent--thanks to the irritationfomented by her brother-in-law--on disputing the ground with him,inch by inch, she must have seen signs, by this time, of thesnare that was being set for her. As it was, she saw nothing butthe opportunity of disparaging Blanche and contradicting SirPatrick.

"If my step-daughter had any such prospect as you describe," sheanswered, "I should of course say, Yes. But Blanche's is anill-regulated mind. An ill-regulated mind has no prospect ofhappiness."

"Pardon me," said Sir Patrick. "Blanche _has_ a prospect ofhappiness. In other words, Blanche has a prospect of beingmarried. And what is more, Arnold Brinkworth is ready to marryher as soon as the settlements can be prepared."

Lady Lundie started in her chair--turned crimson with rage--andopened her lips to speak. Sir Patrick rose to his feet, and wenton before she could utter a word.

"I beg to relieve you, Lady Lundie--by means which you have justacknowledged it to be your duty to accept--of all further chargeof an incorrigible girl. As Blanche's guardian, I have the honorof proposing that her marriage be advanced to a day to behereafter named in the first fortnight of the ensuing month."

In those words he closed the trap which he had set for hissister-in-law, and waited to see what came of it.

A thoroughly spiteful woman, thoroughly roused, is capable ofsubordinating every other consideration to the one imperativenecessity of gratifying her spite. There was but one way now ofturning the tables on Sir Patrick--and Lady Lundie took it. Shehated him, at that moment, so intensely, that not even theassertion of her own obstinate will promised her more than a tamesatisfaction, by comparison with the priceless enjoyment ofbeating her brother-in-law with his own weapons.

"My dear Sir Patrick!" she said, with a little silvery laugh,"you have wasted much precious time and many eloquent words intrying to entrap me into giving my consent, when you might havehad it for the asking. I think the idea of hastening Blanche'smarriage an excellent one. I am charmed to transfer the charge ofsuch a person as my step-daughter to the unfortunate young manwho is willing to take her off my hands. The less he sees ofBlanche's character the more satisfied I shall feel of hisperforming his engagement to marry her. Pray hurry the lawyers,Sir Patrick, and let it be a week sooner rather than a weeklater, if you wish to please Me."

Her ladyship rose in her grandest proportions, and made acourtesy which was nothing less than a triumph of polite satirein dumb show. Sir Patrick answered by a profound bow and a smilewhich said, eloquently, "I believe every word of that charminganswer. Admirable woman--adieu!"

So the one person in the family circle, whose opposition mighthave forced Sir Patrick to submit to a timely delay, was silencedby adroit management of the vices of her own character. So, indespite of herself, Lady Lundie was won over to the project forhurrying the marriage of Arnold and Blanche.