engagement should not be made known to the Duke till something had
occurred, or some time had arrived, as to which Mr Tregear was to
be the judge. In Mrs Finn's opinion nothing could be more unwise,
and she made to induce the girl to confess everything to her
father at once. But in all her arguments she was opposed by the
girl's reference to her mother. 'Mamma knew it.' And it did
certainly seem to Mrs Finn as though the mother had assented to
this imprudent concealment. When she endeavoured, in her own mind,
to make excuse for her friend, she felt almost sure that the
Duchess, with all her courage, had been afraid to propose to her
husband that their daughter should marry a commoner without an
income. But in thinking all that, there could be now nothing
gained. What ought she to do--at once? The girl, in telling her,
had exacted no promise of secrecy, nor would she have given any
such promise; but yet she did not like the idea of telling the
tale behind the girl's back. It was evident that Lady Mary had
considered herself to be safe in confiding her story to her
mother's old friend. Lady Mary no doubt had had her confidence
with her mother,--confidences from which it had been intended by
both that the father should be excluded; and now she seemed
naturally to expect that this new ally should look at this great
question as her mother had looked at it. The father had been
regarded as a great outside power, which could hardly be overcome,
but which might be evaded, or made inoperative by stratagem. It
was not that the daughter did not love him. She loved him and
venerated him highly,--the veneration perhaps being stronger than
the love. The Duchess, too, had loved him dearly,--more dearly in
late years than in her early life. But her husband to her had
always been an outside power which had in many cases to be evaded.
Lady Mary, though she did not express all this, evidently thought