264 The Real Charlotte. 



" How did you find out she was carrying on with 

 Hawkins ? " asked Lambert, with a hoarseness in his voice 

 that belied its indifiference. 



" I knew that they were corresponding, and when I taxed 

 her with carrying on with him she didn't attempt to deny it, 

 and told me up to my face that she could mind her own 

 affairs without my interference. * Very well, Miss,' says I, 

 ' you'll march out of my house ! ' and off she took herself 

 next morning, and has never had the decency to send me a 

 line since." 



" Is she in Dubhn now ? " asked Lambert with the 

 carelessness that was so much more remarkable than an 

 avowed interest. 



*' No ; she's with those starving rats of Fitzpatricks ; they 

 were glad enough to get hold of her to squeeze what they 

 could out of her twenty-five pounds a year, and I wish them 

 joy of their bargain ! " 



Charlotte pushed back her chair violently, and her hot 

 face looked its ugliest as some of the hidden hatred showed 

 itself But Lambert felt that she did well to be angry. In 

 the greater affairs of life he believed in Charlotte, and he 

 admitted to himself that she had done especially well in 

 sending Francie to Bray. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 



The house that the Fitzpatricks had taken in Bray for the 

 winter was not situated in what is known as the fashionable 

 part of the town. It commanded no view either of the 

 Esplanade or of Bray Head ; it had, in fact, little view of 

 any kind except the hacks of other people's houses, and an 

 oblique glimpse of a railway bridge at the end of the road. 

 It was just saved from the artisan level by a tiny bow win- 

 dow on either side of the hall door, and the name, Albatross 

 Villa, painted on the gate posts ; and its crowning claim to 

 distinction was the fact that by standing just outside the 

 gate it was possible to descry, under the railway bridge, a 

 small square of esplanade and sea that was Mrs. Fitzpatrick's 

 justification when she said gallantly to her Dublin friends 



