'Can you spare me a few minutes, mother?'

Mrs. Arundel looked up from the desk where she was writing a letter, and saw her daughter standing before her. She started and changed colour, but quickly recovered, and replied coldly: 'I did not hear you come in, Elsie. What do you want with me?'

Outside, the bells were ringing for Church: it was a quarter to eleven: Mrs. Arundel was already dressed for Church. She was one of those who do not see any incongruity between Church and a heart full of animosities. She was bitter against her daughter, and hard towards her son, and she hated her son-in-law elect with all the powers of her passionate nature. But, my brothers, what an array of bare benches should we see in every place of worship were those only admitted who came with hearts of charity and love!

'Do you wish to keep me long, Elsie? If so, we will sit down. If not, I am ready for Church, and I do not like to arrive late. People in our position should show a good example.'

'I do not think that I shall keep you very long. But if you sit down, you will be so much more comfortable.'

'Comfort, Elsie, you have driven out of this house.'

'I will bring it back with me, then. On Monday evening, mother, I am coming back.'

'Oh! What do you mean, child? Has the blow really fallen? I heard that it was impending. Is the young man—is he—a prisoner?'

'No, mother. You are quite mistaken. You have been mistaken all along. Yet I shall come back on Monday.'

'Alone, then?'

'I shall leave it to you whether I come back alone, or with the two men whom I most regard of all the world—my lover and my brother.'

'You know my opinions, Elsie. There has been no change in them. There can be none.'

'Wednesday is my wedding day.'

'I am not interested in that event, Elsie. After your wedding with such a man, against the opinions, the wishes, the commands of all whom you are bound to respect, I can only say that you are no longer my daughter.'

'Oh! How can you be so fixed in such a belief? Mother, let me make one more appeal to your better feelings. Throw off these suspicions. Believe me, they are baseless. There is not the shadow of a foundation for this ridiculous structure they have raised. Consider. It is now—how long?—three weeks since they brought this charge, and they have proved nothing—absolutely nothing. If you would only be brought to see on what false assumptions the whole thing rests.'

'On solid foundations—hard facts—I want no more.'

'If I could prove to you that Athelstan was in America until a month ago.'

'Unhappy girl! He is deceiving you. He has been living for eight years in profligacy near London. Elsie, do not waste my time. It should be enough for me that my son-in-law, Sir Samuel Dering, a man of the clearest head and widest experience, is convinced that it is impossible to draw any other conclusions.'

'It is enough for me,' Elsie rejoined quickly, 'that my heart tells me that my brother and my lover cannot be such creatures.'

'You have something more to say, I suppose.' Mrs. Arundel buttoned her gloves. The clock was now at five minutes before eleven.

'Yes. If it is no use at all trying to appeal to——'

'No use at all,' Mrs. Arundel snapped. 'I am not disposed for sentimental nonsense.'

'I am sorry, because you will be sorry afterwards. Well, then, I have come to tell you that I have made all the preparations, with George's assistance, for Wednesday.'

'Oh!'

'Yes. The wedding cake will be sent in on Tuesday. My own dress—white satin, of course, very beautiful—is finished and tried on. It will be sent in on Monday evening. The two bridesmaids' dresses will also come on Monday. George has arranged at the Church. He has ordered the carriages and the bouquets and has got the ring. The presents you have already in the house. We shall be married at three. There will be a little gathering of the cousins after the wedding, and you will give them a little simple dinner in the evening, which will, I daresay, end with a little dance. George has also seen to the red cloth for the steps and all that. Oh! And on Tuesday evening you will give a big dinner party to everybody.'

'Are you gone quite mad, Elsie?'

'Not mad at all, my dear mother. It is Sir Samuel who is mad, and has driven you and Hilda mad. Oh! everything will come off exactly as I tell you. Perhaps you don't believe it.'

'You are mad, Elsie. You are certainly mad.'

'No, my dear mother, I am not mad. Oh! it is so absurd, if it were not so serious. But we are determined, George and I, not to make this absurdity the cause of lasting bitterness. Therefore, my dear mother, I do not want to be married from my brother's lodgings, but from your house. You will come to my wedding, I prophesy, full of love—full of love'—her eyes filled with tears—'for me and for George—and for Athelstan—full of love and of sorrow and of self-reproach. I am to be given away by my brother—you will come, I say, with a heart full of love and of pity for him.'

Mrs. Arundel gazed at her stonily.

'Everybody will be there, and you will receive all your friends after the wedding. I have taken care of the invitations. Hilda will be there too, horribly ashamed of herself. It will be a lovely wedding; and we shall go away with such good wishes from yourself as you would not in your present state of mind believe possible. Go now to Church, my dear mother, prepared for a happy and a joyful day.'

'I sometimes believe, Elsie,' said Mrs. Arundel, more coldly still, 'that you have been deprived of your senses. So far from this, I shall not be present at your wedding. I will not interfere with your holding your marriage here, if you like; you may fill the house with your friends, if you please. I shall myself take shelter with my more dutiful daughter. I refuse to meet my unhappy son; I will not be a consenting party to the tie which will entail a lifelong misery——'

'My dear mother—you will do everything exactly as I have prophesied.—Now, do not say any more, because it will only make our reconciliation a little more difficult. I ought to go to Church on the Sunday before my wedding if any day in the week. If you would only recover your trust in my lover's honour, I could go to Church with you and kneel beside you. But without that trust—— Oh! go, my dear mother. You will find my prophecy come true, word for word—believe me or not.'

Mrs. Arundel went to Church. During the service she felt strange prickings of foreboding and of compunction and of fear, anxiety, and hope, with a little sadness, caused by the communication and the assurances of her daughter. Even in such a case as this, the thinker of evil is sometimes depressed by the arrival of the prophet of good. When Mrs. Arundel came away from Church, she became aware that she had not heard one single word of the sermon. Not that she wanted very much to hear the sermon, any more than the First or Second Lesson—all three being parts of the whole which every person of respectability must hear once a week. Only it was disquieting to come away after half an hour's discourse with the feeling that she did not remember a single syllable of it. She took her early dinner with the other daughter, to whom she communicated Elsie's remarkable conduct, and her prediction and her invitation. It was decided between them that her brain was affected—no doubt, only for a time—and that it was not expedient for them to interfere; that it was deplorable, but a part of what might have been expected; and that time would show. Meanwhile, Sir Samuel reported that it had been resolved to get a warrant for the arrest of the man Edmund Gray, who hitherto had eluded all attempts to find him.

'He appears to be a real person,' the knight concluded—'an elderly man, whose character, so far as we can learn, is good. It is, however, significant that nothing has been discovered concerning his profession or calling. That is mysterious. For my own part, I like to know how a man earns his daily bread. I have even consulted a person connected with the Police. Nothing is known or suspected about him. But we shall see as soon as he is before the magistrate.'

'And Wednesday is so close! Oh! my dear Sir Samuel, hurry them up. Even at the last moment—even at the risk of a terrible scandal—if Elsie could be saved!'

'Well,' said Sir Samuel, 'it is curious—I don't understand it—we had arranged for the application for a warrant for Friday morning. Would you believe it? That old donkey Checkley won't go for it—wants it put off—says he thinks it will be of no use. What with this young man Austin at first, and this old man Checkley next, we seem in a conspiracy to defeat the ends of justice. But to-morrow I shall go myself to my brother. It is time this business was finished.'

'Yes—yes,' said Mrs. Arundel. 'And my dear Sir Samuel, before Wednesday—let it be before Wednesday, I implore you, for all our sakes!'

'My dear Madam, it shall be to-morrow.'

At noon, Elsie returned to Half Moon Street, where George was waiting for her.

'I have made one more attempt,' she said, with tears; 'but it was useless. Her heart is as hard about you as ever it was about Athelstan. It is wonderful that she should have so little faith. I suppose it comes of going into the City and trying to make money. Edmund Gray would say so. I would have told her all, but for the old man's sake. He knows nothing: he suspects nothing; and I want to make the case so complete that there shall be no doubt—none whatever—possible in the minds of the most suspicious. Even Checkley must be satisfied. I shall finish the work, I hope, this afternoon— Oh! George—is it possible? Is our wedding day next Wednesday—actually next Wednesday? And the hateful cloud shall be blown away, and—and—and——'

For the rest of this chapter look into the book of holy kisses, where you will very likely find it.