CHAPTER IV.
THE COUNTESS-DOWAGER.
The guests had arrived, and Hartledon was alive with bustle and lights.
The first link in the chain, whose fetters were to bind more than one victim, had been forged.

Link upon link; a heavy, despairing burden no hand could lift; a burden which would have to be borne for the most part in dread secrecy and silence.
Mirrable had exerted herself to good purpose, and Mirrable was capable of it when occasion needed.

Help had been procured from Calne, and on the Friday evening several of the Hartledon servants arrived from the town-house.

"None but a young man would have put us to such a rout," quoth Mirrable, in her privileged freedom; "my lord and lady would have sent a week's notice at least." But when Lord Hartledon arrived on the Saturday evening with his guests, Mirrable was ready for them.
She stood at the entrance to receive them, in her black-silk gown and lace cap, its broad white-satin strings falling on either side the bunch of black ringlets that shaded her thin face.

Who, to look at her quick, sharp countenance, with its practical sense, her active frame, her ready speech, her general capability, would believe her to be sister to that silly, dreaming Mrs.Gum?
But it was so.