said Lady Portmore; "but in Stuart's case his cabriolet is an actual measure of economy; he sold those magnificent carriage-horses when he set it up. I must repeat that I think he is in a very pitiable position. He is willing to submit to every sort of privation; but, as he says, what is the use of trying, if his family will not help him? "
"I thought his mother was very liberal to him."
"Yes, she makes him some sort of allowance; but she does not do all that he expected. And that is where I think his family so much to blame; they help him only to a certain extent. And that, as he says, puts him in a false position; he gets the reputation of having his debts paid over and over again, and yet he is never so entirely clear as to feel encouraged to live economically. No, it really makes my heart bleed to think of all those selfish Weybridges, and to see Stuart so unlike himself."
"Has not your friend Miss Forrester," said Lord Beaufort, "a great share of Stuart's low spirits to answer for?"
"If you mean that he cares about her," said Lady Portmore, "that is what he never did and never will, in my opinion; but at one time he had certainly a good right to expect that she would marry him, and it is a great pity she did not."
"She jilted him in the coolest manner when she inherited that fortune, did not she?" said Lord Beaufort.
"Had you not better look behind that screen, Beaufort, before you proceed?" whispered Ernest.
"Pho! nonsense," he said; but he started from his chair as he spoke, for, leaning against the door of the conservatory, where she and Eliza had gone to gather flowers, stood Mary Forrester, and any faint hopes which he might have entertained of not having been overheard were dissipated by the decided measure she took of walking straight up to the table and addressing him.
