Mrs. Burton, though she had loved Harry dearly, and had perhaps in many respects liked him better than any of her sons-in-law, had, nevertheless, felt some misgivings from the first. Florence was brighter, better educated, and cleverer than her elder sisters, and therefore when it had come to pass that she was asked in marriage by a man somewhat higher in rank and softer in manners than they who had married her sisters, there had seemed to be some reason for the change;—but Mrs. Burton had felt that it was a ground for apprehension. High rank and soft manners may not always belong to a true heart. At first she was unwilling to hint this caution even to herself; but at last, as her suspicions grew, she spoke the words very frequently, not only to herself but also to her husband. Why, oh why, had she let into her house any man differing in mode of life from those whom she had known to be honest and good? How would her gray hairs be made to go in sorrow to the grave, if, after all her old prudence and all her old success, her last pet lamb should be returned to the mother’s side, ill-used, maimed, and blighted!
Theodore Burton, when he received his mother’s letter, had not seen Harry since his return from Clavering. He had been inclined to be very angry with him for his long and unannounced absence from the office. “He will do no good,” he had said to his wife. “He does not know what real work means.” But his anger turned to disgust as regarded Harry, and almost to despair as regarded his sister, when Harry had been a week in town and yet had not shown himself at the Adelphi. But at this time Theodore Burton had heard no word of Lady Ongar, though the clerks in the office had that name daily in their mouths. “Cannot you go to him, Theodore?” said his wife. “It is very easy to say go to him,” he replied. “If I made it my business I could, of course, go to him, and no doubt find him if I was determined to do so;—but what more could I do? I can lead a horse to the water, but I cannot make him drink.” “You could speak to him of Florence.” “That is such a woman’s idea,” said the husband. “When every proper incentive to duty and ambition has failed him, he is to be brought into the right way by the mention of a girl’s name!” “May I see him?” Cecilia urged. “Yes—if you can catch him; but I do not advise you to try.”
After that came the two letters for the husband and wife, each of which was shown to the other; and then for the first time did either of them receive the idea that Lady Ongar with her fortune might be a cause of misery to their sister. “I don’t believe a word of it,” said Cecilia, whose cheeks were burning, half with shame and half with anger. Harry had been such a pet with her—had already been taken so closely to her heart as a brother! “I should not have suspected him of that kind of baseness,” said Theodore, very slowly. “He is not base,” said Cecilia. “He may be idle and foolish, but he is not base.”
“I must at any rate go after him now,” said Theodore. “I don’t believe this;—I won’t believe it. I do not believe it. But if it should be true—!”
“Oh, Theodore.”
“I do not think it is true. It is not the kind of weakness I have seen in him. He is weak and vain, but I should have said that he was true.”
“I am sure he is true.”
“I think so. I cannot say more than that I think so.”
“You will write to your mother?”
“Yes.”
“And may I ask Florence to come up? Is it not always better that people should be near to each other when they are engaged?”
“You can ask her, if you like. I doubt whether she will come.”
“She will come if she thinks that anything is amiss with him.”
Cecilia wrote immediately to Florence, pressing her invitation in the strongest terms that she could use. “I tell you the whole truth,” she said. “We have not seen him, and this, of course, has troubled us very greatly. I feel quite sure he would come to us if you were here; and this, I think, should bring you, if no other consideration does so. Theodore imagines that he has become simply idle, and that he is ashamed to show himself here because of that. It may be that he has some trouble with reference to his own home, of which we know nothing. But if he has any such trouble, you ought to be made aware of it, and I feel sure that he would tell you if you were here.” Much more she said, arguing in the same way, and pressing Florence to come to London.
Mr. Burton did not at once send a reply to his mother, but he wrote the following note to Harry:—
Adelphi—, May, 186‒.
My dear Clavering—I have been sorry to notice your continued absence from the office, and both Cecilia and I have been very sorry that you have discontinued coming to us. But I should not have written to you on this matter, not wishing to interfere in your own concerns, had I not desired to see you specially with reference to my sister. As I have that to say to you concerning her which I can hardly write, will you make an appointment with me here, or at my house? Or, if you cannot do that, will you say when I shall find
