"Yours,
E. MALTRAVERS."


"Hurrah!" cried Ferrers, as he threw down the letter, and rubbed his
hands with delight. "I little thought, when I schemed for this letter,
that chance would make it so inestimably serviceable. There is less to
alter than I thought for--the clumsiest botcher in the world could
manage it. Let me look again. Hem, hem--the first phrase to alter is
this: 'I know her enough to feel deep solicitude and anxiety for /your/
happiness if centred in a nature so imperious and vain'--scratch out
'your,' and put 'my.' All the rest good, good--till we come to
'affections which you ascribe to her, and suppose devoted to
/yourself/'--for '/yourself/' write '/myself/'--the rest will do. Now,
then, the date--we must change it to the present month, and the work is
done. I wish that Italian blockhead would come. If I can but once make
an irreparable breach between her and Maltravers, I think I cannot fail
of securing his place; her pique, her resentment, will hurry her into
taking the first who offers, by way of revenge. And by Jupiter, even if
I fail (which I am sure I shall not), it will be something to keep Flory
as lady paramount for a duke of our own party. I shall gain immensely
by such a connection; but I lose everything and gain nothing by her
marrying Maltravers--of opposite politics too--whom I begin to hate like
poison. But no duke shall have her--Florence Ferrers, the only
alliteration I ever liked--yet it would sound rough in poetry."

Lumley then deliberately drew towards him his inkstand--"No
penknife!--Ah, true, I never mend pens--sad waste--must send out for
one." He rang the bell, ordered a penknife to be purchased, and the