But every one had conspired to throw them together.

Lady Fitzgerald had welcomed her like a mother, with more caressing soft tenderness than her own mother usually vouchsafed to her; and even Sir Thomas had gone out of his usual way to be kind to her.
That her mother would approve of such a marriage she could not doubt.
Lady Desmond in these latter days had not said much to her about Owen; but she had said very much of the horrors of poverty.

And she had been too subtle to praise the virtues of Herbert with open plain words; but she had praised the comforts of a handsome income and well-established family mansion.

Clara at these times had understood more than had been intended, and had, therefore, put herself on her guard against her mother's worldly wisdom; but, nevertheless, the dropping of the water had in some little measure hollowed the stone beneath.
And thus, thinking of these things, she stood at the window for some half-hour after the form of her accepted lover had become invisible in the gathering gloom of the evening.
And then her mother entered the room, and candles were brought.

Lady Desmond was all smiles and benignity, as she had been for this last week past, while Herbert Fitzgerald had been coming and going almost daily at Desmond Court.