I said I knew one of your lungs had gone after a former unfortunate love-affair, and that I could not answer for the other if the lady here were cruel. She spoke of a respirator; but I told her that might do very well for the odd lung; but would it minister to a heart diseased? I really did talk fine. I have found out the secret of eloquence – it’s believing what you’ve got to say; and I worked myself well up with fancying you married to the little lady in blue.”

‘I got to laughing at last, angry as I had been; his impudence was irresistible. Mrs Rose had come home in the sedan, and gone to bed; and he and I sat up over the round of beef and brandy-and-water till two o’clock in the morning.

‘He told me I had got quite into the professional way of mousing about a room, and mewing and purring according as my patients were ill or well. He mimicked me, and made me laugh at myself. He left early the next morning.

‘Mr Morgan came at his usual hour; he and Marshland would never have agreed, and I should have been uncomfortable to see two friends of mine disliking and despising each other.

‘Mr Morgan was ruffled; but with his deferential manner to women, he smoothed himself down before Mrs Rose – regretted that he had not been able to come to Miss Tomkinson’s the evening before, and consequently had not seen her in the society she was so well calculated to adorn. But when we were by ourselves, he said –

‘“I was sent for to Mrs Munton’s this morning – the old spasms. May I ask what is this story she tells me about – about prison, in fact? I trust, sir, she has made some little mistake, and that you never were – ; that it is an unfounded report.” He could not get it out – “that you were in Newgate for three months!” I burst out laughing; the story had grown like a mushroom indeed. Mr Morgan looked grave. I told him the truth. Still he looked grave. “I’ve no doubt, sir, that you acted rightly; but it has an awkward sound. I imagined from your hilarity just now that there was no foundation whatever for the story. Unfortunately, there is.”

‘“I was only a night at the police-station. I would go there again for the same cause, sir.”

‘“Very fine spirit, sir – quite like Don Quixote; but don’t you see you might as well have been to the hulks at once?”

‘“No, sir; I don’t.”

‘“Take my word, before long, the story will have grown to that. However, we won’t anticipate evil. Mens conscia recti, you remember, is the great thing. The part I regret is, that it may require some short time to overcome a little prejudice which the story may excite against you. However, we won’t dwell on it. Mens conscia recti! Don’t think about it, sir.”

‘It was clear he was thinking a good deal about it.

Chapter X

‘TWO OR THREE days before this time, I had had an invitation from the Bullocks to dine with them on Christmas-day. Mrs Rose was going to spend the week with friends in the town where she formerly lived; and I had been pleased at the notion of being received into a family, and of being a little with Mr Bullock, who struck me as a bluff good-hearted fellow.

‘But this Tuesday before Christmas-day, there came an invitation from the Vicar to dine there; there were to be only their own family and Mr Morgan. “Only their own family.” It was getting to be all the world to me. I was in a passion with myself for having been so ready to accept Mr Bullock’s invitation – coarse and ungentlemanly as he was; with his wife’s airs of pretension and Miss Bullock’s stupidity. I turned it over in my mind. No! I could not have a bad headache, which should prevent me going to the place I did not care for, and yet leave me at liberty to go where I wished. All I could do was to join the vicarage girls after church, and walk by their side in a long country ramble. They were quiet; not sad, exactly; but it was evident that the thought of Walter was in their minds on this day. We went through a copse where there were a good number of evergreens planted as covers for game. The snow was on the ground; but the sky was clear and bright, and the sun glittered on the smooth holly-leaves. Lizzie asked me to gather her some of the very bright red berries, and she was beginning a sentence with –

‘“Do you remember –” when Ellen said “Hush,” and looked towards Sophy, who was walking a little apart, and crying softly to herself.