Wealth for its own sake she
valued not a jot. But she lived in an age in which wealth is power, and
ambition was her ruling passion. As she had been ambitious for her
husband in the days that were gone, she was now ambitious for her
granddaughter. Time had intensified the keen eagerness of her mind. She
had been disappointed, cruelly, bitterly, in the ambition of her youth.
She had been made to drink the cup of shame and humiliation. But to this
ambition of her old age she held with even greater tenacity. God help
her if she should be disappointed here!
It is not to be supposed that so astute a schemer as Lady Maulevrier had
not surveyed the marriage market in order to discover that fortunate
youth who should be deemed worthy to become the winner of Lesbia's hand.
Years ago, when Lesbia was still in the nursery, the dowager had made
herself informed of the age, weight, and colours of every likely runner
in the matrimonial stakes; or, in plainer words, had kept herself, by
her correspondence with a few intimate friends, and her close study of
the fashionable newspapers, thoroughly acquainted with the characters
and exploits, the dispositions and antecedents, of those half-dozen
elder sons, among whom she hoped to find Lesbia's lord and master.
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