At the age of thirty or so, Quentin succeeded to the baronetcy.

In the same year his son died.

No other offspring had blessed, or was to bless, the romantic union.
Behold Arabella, erst of Camden Town, installed as mistress of a house in Mayfair and reigning over Rivenoak.

Inevitably, legends were rife about her; where the exact truth was not known, people believed worse.
Her circle of society was but a narrow one; but for two classes of well-dressed people, the unscrupulous snobs and the cheerily indifferent, her drawing-room would have been painfully bare.

Some families knew her because Sir Quentin was one of the richest men in his county; certain persons accepted her invitations because she was not exactly like other hostesses, and could talk in rather an amusing way.
The years went on; scandal lost its verdure; Lady Ogram was accepted as a queer woman with a queer history, a rather vulgar eccentric, whose caprices and enterprises afforded agreeable matter for gossip.