"Conquer a world--come to luncheon? A pretty brace of subjects!" said her father.
"Miss Hunsden is quite capable of conquering a world without having been born anything so horrid as a boy," said Lord Ernest. "There are bloodless conquests, wherein the conquerors of the world are conquered themselves."
The baronet scowled. Miss Hunsden retorted saucily. She and Lord Ernest kept up a brilliant wordy war.
He sat like a silent fool--like an imbecile, he said to himself, glowering malignantly. He was madly in love, and he was furiously jealous. What business had this ginger-whiskered young lordling interloping here? And how disgustingly self-assured and at home he was! He tried to talk to the captain, but it was a miserable failure.
It was a relief when a servant entered with the mailbag.
"The mail reaches us late," Captain Hunsden said, as he opened it. "I like my letters with my breakfast."
"Any for me, papa?" Harriet asked.
"One--from your governess in Paris, I think--and half a dozen for me."
He glanced carelessly at the superscriptions as he laid them down. But as he took the last he uttered a low cry; his face turned livid: he stared at it as if it had turned into a death's-head in his hand.
"Oh, papa--"
She stopped in a sort of breathless affright.
Captain Hunsden rose up. He made no apology. He walked to a window and tore open his letter with passionate haste.
His daughter still stood--pale, breathless.
Suddenly, with a hoarse, dreadful cry, he flung the letter from him, staggered blindly, and fell down in a fit.
A girl's shrill scream pierced the air. She sprung forward, thrust the letter into her bosom, knelt beside her father, and lifted his head. His face was dark purple, the blood oozed in trickling streams from his mouth and nostrils.
All was confusion. They bore him to his room; a servant was dispatched in mad haste for a doctor. Harriet bent over him, white as death. The two young men waited, pale, alarmed, confounded.
It was an hour before the doctor came--another before he left the sick man's room. As he departed, Harriet Hunsden glided into the apartment where the young men waited, white as a spirit.
"He is out of danger; he is asleep. Pray leave us now. To-morrow he will be himself again."
It was quite evident that she was used to these attacks. The young men bowed respectfully and departed.
Sir Everard was in little humor, as he went slowly and moodily homeward, for his mother's lecture.
"There is some secret in Captain Hunsden's life," he thought, "and his daughter shares it. Some secret, perhaps, of shame and disgrace--some bar sinister in their shield; and, good heavens! I am mad enough to love her--I, a Kingsland, of Kingsland, whose name and escutcheon are without a blot! What do I know of her antecedents or his? My mother spoke of some mystery in his past life; and there is a look of settled gloom in his face that nothing seems able to remove. Lord Ernest Strathmore, too--he must come to complicate matters. She is the most glorious creature the sun shines on; and if I don't ask her to be my wife, she will be my Lady Strathmore before the moon wanes!"