"
"You don't mean that you'll--fight him!"
"No, my darling. Men don't fight each other nowadays--not often, at least
--and Fawn and I are not of the fighting sort. I can make him understand
what I mean and what others will mean without fighting him. He is making a
paltry excuse."
"But why should he want to excuse himself--without reason?"
"Because he is afraid. People have got hold of him and told him lies, and
he thinks there will be a scrape about this necklace, and he hates a
scrape. He'll marry her at last, without a doubt, and Lady Fawn is only
making trouble for herself by trying to prevent it. You can't do
anything."
"Oh no--I can't do anything. When she was here it became at last quite
disagreeable. She hardly spoke to them, and I'm sure that even the
servants understood that there was a quarrel." She did not say a word of
Lizzie's offer of the brooch to herself, nor of the stories which by
degrees were reaching her ears as to the old debts, and the diamonds, and
the young bride's conduct to Lady Linlithgow as soon as she married her
grand husband, Sir Florian. She did think badly of Lizzie, and could not
but regret that her own noble, generous Frank should have to expend his
time and labour on a friend unworthy of his friendship; but there was no
shade of jealousy in her feeling, and she uttered no word against Lizzie
more bitter than that in which she declared that there was a difference
between people.
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