“As to her knowing what has happened, it can’t be kept from her long,” said Mrs. Hackbutt. “The Vincys know, for Mr. Vincy was at the meeting. It will be a great blow to him. There is his daughter as well as his sister.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Mrs. Sprague. “Nobody supposes that Mr. Lydgate can go on holding up his head in Middlemarch, things look so black about the thousand pounds he took just at that man’s death. It really makes one shudder.”

“Pride must have a fall,” said Mrs. Hackbutt.

“I am not so sorry for Rosamond Vincy that was as I am for her aunt,” said Mrs. Plymdale. “She needed a lesson.”