"Oh! leave all that to me!" exclaimed Charlotte, who relished the joke amazingly. "But what shall I do about my place at Lady Hatfield's?" "Deuce take your place, my dear!" cried Frank. "I'll secure beautiful lodgings for you in some nice, quiet, retired street at the West End, and you shall be as happy as the day's long. We'll have such fun together—and I'll take you to plays and all kinds of amusements. Lord bless you! I think no more of a cool thousand or two than I should of blowing out a chap's brains if he was to insult you."
"Oh! dear me, don't talk so horrid!" exclaimed Charlotte, laughing. "And you really will do all you say—if I help you in this business?"
"Yes—and much more," returned Frank. "And now the only thing to manage, is to prevent Miss Mordaunt keeping the appointment by herself. Oh! I have it!" he exclaimed, after a minute's reflection. "I can imitate my uncle's handwriting to a _t_. He writes just as if he had a skewer instead of a pen—and so do I, for that matter. So I'll just tip Miss Julia a note to-morrow afternoon about four, as if it came from Sir Christopher; and I'll tell her in it that the elopement must be postponed until the next night. Egad! this is a stroke of policy that beats hollow any thing my cousin the Duke of Dumplington ever did."
"I thought he was your uncle, sir?" remarked Charlotte.
"I meant my uncle, love," replied Frank: "but it's all the same. The Marquis of Dumplington is my relation—and that's enough. And now, my sweet creature, that we have settled all this business—suppose we adjourn to a nice quiet place that I know——"
"But I must see my sister to-night and tell her all that there is to be done," interrupted Charlotte.
The fact is that the pretty lady's-maid had kept the appointment given her by Frank Curtis, with the full intention of abandoning her person to him; for she was alike wanton in her passions and mercenary in her disposition; and the five guineas which he had given her in the morning had stimulated her with the desire of making farther inroads upon his purse. Nay—she had even hoped that he would fulfil the sort of promise he had given her at their previous interview, and, in plain terms, establish her as his mistress in a comfortable manner. But the intrigue just concocted for the purpose of defeating the matrimonial design of Miss Mordaunt and Sir Christopher Blunt, had engendered new ideas in the breast of the lady's-maid; and she resolved that her intimacy with Mr. Curtis should progress no farther for the present.