"She's a delicious creature, that!" soliloquised the titled _roue_, as he proceeded to the Park Road, where a carriage, drawn up under the shadow of the trees, had been all the while waiting for him. "And a trump to boot! I can tell that by the touch of her taper fingers."

"She's a trump and a treasure!" was the almost simultaneous reflection of Swinton, with the same woman in his thoughts--his own wife!

He made it, after closing the door upon his departing guest; and then, as he sat gulping another glass of sherry, and smoking another cigar, he repeated it with the continuation:

"Yes; Fan's the correct card to play. What a stupid I've been not to think of this before! Hang it! it's not yet too late. I've still got hold of the hand; and this night, if I'm not mistaken, there's a game begun that'll give me all I want in this world--that's Julia Girdwood."

The serious tone in which the last three words were spoken told he had not yet resigned his aspirations after the American heiress.

CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT.

IMPROVED PROSPECTS.

To those who take no note of social distinctions, Swinton's scheme in relation to Julia Girdwood will appear grotesque. Not so much on account of its atrocity, but from the chances of its success seeming so problematical.

Could he have got the girl to love him, it would have changed the aspect of affairs. Love breaks down all barriers; and to a mind constituted as hers, no obstacle could have intervened--not even the idea of danger.

She did not love him; but he did not know it. A guardsman, and handsome to boot, he had been accustomed to facile conquests. In his own way of thinking, the time had not arrived when these should be deemed difficult.

He was no longer in the Guards; but he was still young, and he knew he was still handsome English dames thought him so. Strange if a Yankee girl should have a different opinion!

This was the argument on his side; and, trusting to his attractions, he still fancied himself pretty sure of being able to make a conquest of the American--even to making her the victim of an illegal marriage.

And if he should succeed in his bigamous scheme, what then? What use would she be as a wife, unless her mother should keep that promise he had overheard: to endow her with the moiety of her own life-interest in the estate of the deceased storekeeper?

To many Julia Girdwood against her mother's wish would be a simple absurdity. He did not dread the danger that might accrue from the crime. He did not think of it. But to become son-in-law to a woman, whose daughter might remain penniless as long as she herself lived, would be a poor speculation. A woman, too, who talked of living another half-century! The jest was not without significance; and Swinton thought so.

He felt confident that he could dupe the daughter into marrying him; but to get that half-million out of the mother, he must stand before the altar as a _lord_!

These were Mrs Girdwood's original conditions. He knew she still adhered to them. If fulfilled, she would still consent; but not otherwise.

To go on, then, the sham _incognito_ must be continued--the deception kept up.

But how?

This was the point that puzzled him.

The impersonation had become difficult. In Newport and New York it had been easy; in Paris still easier; but he was at length in London, where such a cheat would be in danger of being detected.

Moreover, in his last interview with the ladies, he had been sensible of some change in their behaviour toward him--an absence of the early congeniality. It was shown chiefly by Mrs Girdwood herself! Her warm friendship suddenly conceived at Newport, continued in New York, and afterwards renewed in Paris, appeared to have as suddenly grown cool.

What could be the cause? Had she heard anything to his discredit?

Could she have discovered the counterfeit? Or was she only suspicious of it?

Only the last question troubled him. He did not think he had been found out. He had played his part skilfully, having given no clue to his concealed title. And he had given good reasons for his care in concealing it.

He admitted to himself that she had cause for being suspicious. She had extended hospitality to him in America. He had not returned it in Europe, for reasons well-known.

True, he had only met his American acquaintances in Paris; but even there, an English lord should have shown himself more liberal; and she might have felt piqued at his parsimony.

For similar reasons he had not yet called upon them in London.

On the contrary, since his return, he had purposely kept out of their way.

In England he was in his own country; and why should he be living under an assumed name? If a lord, why under straitened circumstances? In Mrs Girdwood's eyes these would be suspicious circumstances.

The last might be explained--by the fact of their being poor lords, though not many. Not many, who do not find the means to dress well, and dine sumptuously--to keep a handsome house, if they feel disposed.

Since his return from the States, Swinton could do none of these things.

How, then, was he to pass himself off for a lord--even one of the poorest?

He had almost despaired of being able to continue the counterfeit; when the patronage of a lord, real and powerful, inspired him with fresh hope. Through it his prospects had become entirely changed. It had put money in his purse, and promised more. What was equally encouraging, he could now, in real truth, claim being employed in a diplomatic capacity.

True, it was but as a _spy_; but this is an essential part of the diplomatic service!

There was his apparent intimacy with a distinguished diplomatic character--a nobleman; there would be his constant visits to the grand mansion in Park Lane--strange if with these appearances in his favour he could not still contrive to throw dust in the eyes of Dame Girdwood!

Certainly his scheme was far from hopeless. By the new appointment a long vista of advantages had been suddenly disclosed to him; and he now set himself to devise the best plan for improving them.

Fan was called into his counsels; for the wife was still willing. Less than ever did she care for him, or what he might do. She, too, had become conscious of brighter prospects; and might hope, at no distant day, to appear once more in Rotten Row.

If, otherwise, she had a poor opinion of her husband, she did not despise his talent for intrigue. There was proof of it in their changed circumstances. And though she well knew the source from which their sudden prosperity had sprung, she knew, also, the advantage, to a woman of her propensities, in being a _wife_. "United we stand, divided we fall," may have been the thought in her mind; but, whether it was or not, she was still ready to assist her husband in accomplishing a second marriage!

With the certificate of the first, carefully stowed away in a secret drawer of her dressing-case, she had nothing to fear, beyond the chance of a problematical exposure.

She did not fear this, so long as there was a prospect of that splendid plunder, in which she would be a sharer. Dick had promised to be "true as steel," and she had reciprocated the promise.

With a box of cigars, and a decanter of sherry between them, a programme was traced out for the further prosecution of the scheme.

CHAPTER FIFTY NINE.

A DISTINGUISHED DINNER-PARTY.

It was a chill November night; but there was no coldness inside the South Bank Cottage--the one occupied by Mr Richard Swinton.

There was company in it.

There had been a dinner-party, of nine covers. The dinner was eaten; and the diners had returned to the drawing-room.

The odd number of nine precluded an exact pairing of the sexes. The ladies out-counted the gentlemen, by five to four.

Four of them are already known to the reader. They were Mrs Swinton, Mrs Girdwood, her daughter and niece. The fifth was a stranger, not only to the reader, but to Mrs Girdwood and her girls.

Three of the gentlemen were the host himself Mr Louis Lucas, and his friend Mr Spiller. The fourth, like the odd lady, was a stranger.

He did not appear strange to Mrs Swinton; who during the dinner had treated him with remarkable familiarity, calling him her "dear Gustave"; while he in turn let the company know she was his _wife_!