The Reluctant Widow

Chapter XII

When he reappeared, in time for dinner, Lord Bedlington seemed to have shaken off his petulance. He sighed heavily from time to time and twice was obliged to wipe his eyes, but his hosts were gratified to observe that his bereavement had not affected his appetite. He partook lavishly of every dish and was so much moved by the excellence of the Davenport fowls, stuffed, parboiled, and stewed in butter, that he sent a complimentary message to the cook and congratulated Carlyon on having acquired such a treasure. By the time he had worked his way from the Hessian soup and ragout which began the repast through a baked carp dressed in the Portuguese way, some beefsteaks with oyster sauce, the fowls, and a floating island, with a fruit pie as a remove, he was so far reconciled to his nephew’s death as to be able to recount three of the latest good stories circulating town and to confide to Carlyon as he ecstatically savored the bouquet of the port, that he really could not agree with his old friend Brummell in deeming it a wine only fit for the lower orders to drink. He certainly drank a great many glasses of it, but whatever hopes John might have cherished of his tongue’s being loosened soon vanished. My Lord Bedlington had not kept company with the Regent for years without acquiring a hard head and the digestion of an ostrich. Mellow he might become, and indiscreet stories he certainly told, but not his worst enemy would have accused him of being foxed.

When he could at last be parted from the decanters Carlyon took him off to his library, firmly excluding John by saying that he knew he had letters he wished to write. John made a face at him but bowed to this decree and went off to kick his heels in one of the saloons.

After commenting on the comfort of a log fire, the luxury of the chair he was sitting in, and the superlative qualities of the brandy he was rolling round his palate, his lordship seemed to bethink him of his nephew again and to recall the sad circumstance which had brought him into Sussex. He very handsomely owned that he believed Carlyon had acted always with the best of intentions, and even confessed that his own partiality for his dear brother’s only son might have made him overlenient toward faults in Eustace which he perceived as clearly as anyone could wish. He blamed the most of them on the bad company which Eustace had kept, and, lowering his tone to a confidential note, asked Carlyon if he had any reason to fear that Eustace might have been in some worse scrape than any of them suspected.

“I have sometimes wondered whence he obtained the means to live as expensively as he did,” responded Carlyon, in his level voice,

“Yes!” Bedlington said eagerly. “Yes, indeed, and I too have wondered! I do trust we may not find anything seriously amiss! I cannot flatter myself the poor boy took me as much into his confidence as I could have wished.”

“He certainly did not take me into it.”

“No, well! I do not desire to mar the harmony of this evening by reproaching you, and I shall accordingly say nothing of that. Yet I cannot but feel that had you treated him with more sympathy—”

“My dear sir, you, I am persuaded, treated him with a marked degree of sympathy, but it does not appear to have won you his confidence.”

“True. It is very true! Sometimes I have asked myself if I caressed him too much, allowed him too much license. You know he has been free to treat my house as his home ever since his poor father’s death—that is to say, ever since he was of an age to be glad of a house in town where he might be sure of a welcome. Indeed, I have treated him like my own son, but I do not know that it answered. I hope I have not been the innocent means of leading him into temptation!”

Carlyon looked faintly surprised. “How should you be, indeed?”

“Oh, as to that—! In an establishment such as mine, you understand—my position as A.D.C. to the Regent. I need not say more! I am sure I do not know the half of the people who come to the house, and how could I tell whom poor Eustace might be meeting there? Young men cannot always be trusted to keep the line, and alas, there was a weakness in him—one must own it!—that might have led him to allow himself to be drawn into the wrong company.”

He went on in this strain for some time, but as his host remained politely unresponsive, abandoned it at last and relapsed into melancholy abstraction. He roused himself to inquire about the funeral arrangements, desiring Carlyon to postpone the date to enable him to attend the ceremony and almost tearfully begging him not to neglect the least pompous detail of it. Upon hearing that the cortege would set out from the chapel where Eustace’s body was at present lying, and not from Highnoons, he looked very much shocked and could not think it right. He wished to know the style of the cards Carlyon had no doubt sent out and the number of carriages he had ordered, not to mention the mutes and the plumes, and was only silenced by Carlyon’s saying that since Eustace, after making himself odious to the entire neighborhood, had met his end in a drunken brawl that must still further lessen his credit with his acquaintances, the more private and unostentatious his obsequies were the better it would be for all concerned.

“I shall attend the funeral!” Bedlington declared. “I mean to spend a night with that poor young creature at Highnoons. I dare say she will be glad of the counsel of an old man. I am sure I do not know what is to become of her, for it is not to be expected that Eustace has left her in affluence. That crazy old house, very nearly in ruins, from what I could see of it! It would cost a fortune to put it in order, and there she is, saddled with its upkeep and none to support or guide her!”

“Mrs. Cheviot does not reside there alone. She has an elderly companion with her.”

“Yes, yes, a poor little dab of a woman! I don’t know what your notions may be, Carlyon, but I should advise selling the place if any could be found to buy such a ramshackle, old-fashioned house.”

“No doubt she will do so, but until we have probate it is too early to be making plans.”

“Of course. That is understood! But she cannot like to have such a place on her hands and to be put to the expense of paying the wages of I dare say four or five servants. I feel I should do all I can for her—poor Eustace’s bride, you know, and her circumstances so uncomfortable, for there is no blinking the fact that her father died under a cloud! I declare, I have a good mind to invite her to come up to London with me and to stay in Brook Street until she knows how things may stand! Then the servants may be paid off and the house closed. What do you say to that, eh?”

“I cannot advocate the leaving of the house untenanted, sir,” was all the answer he could win from Carlyon.

He very soon took himself off to bed, and Carlyon was able to join John, whom he found yawning over a dying fire.

“Hallo!” John said. “Has he been boring on forever? You should have let me bear you company!”

“No, you are too severe with him. He cannot talk al his ease in face of your grim scowls. I find it hard myself.”

“You!” John said, bursting out into a laugh. “Well, had he anything to say that was to the point?”

“He is very uneasy, I fancy. There was some talk of his having unwittingly led Eustace into temptation, as though he had a suspicion some worse mischief than he knows of might have been on hand.”

“Led him into temptation! Pray, how?”

“Apparently he feels that his house is forever full of evil company. He says he does not know the half of the people who frequent it, and ascribes this to his being the Regent’s A.D.C.,” Carlyon said, with only a flicker of a smile.

“A delightful reflection upon Prinny! Refreshingly honest, I swear!”

“I am going to bed,” Carlyon said. “An evening spent in Bedlington’s company is the most fatiguing thing I know. I pity Mrs. Cheviot! He is a dead bore!”

“Oh, he still stands by his threat to inflict himself upon her, does he?”

“Yes, and to invite her to return to Brook Street with him while Highnoons is shut up and the servants dismissed.”

“Ha! So that he may search the place at his leisure!” said John, grinning. “Much obliged to him!” He accompanied his brother out into the hall and picked up his bedroom candle. “When have you arranged the funeral? Should I attend?”

“As you wish. I must do so, at all events. It is postponed for two days, Bedlington having affairs that must keep him in town.”

“Deuce take the old fidget!” John growled. “You will be glad to be done with this, Ned, and know Eustace safe underground!”

“I shall certainly be glad to be done with it, and wish I saw my way through it.”

John gripped his elbow, roughly squeezing it. “Ay, it has been the devil of a business. As for seeing your way, I do not wonder you cannot! Here is this widow left on your hands, as I told you before! Well, it serves you right, old fellow!”

“Nonsense!” Carlyon said.

In the morning, Lord Bedlington made his appearance dressed for his journey. A somewhat malicious suggestion, put forward by John, that he must surely wish to attend the inquest which was to be held in the coffee room of the inn at Wisborough Green, he greeted with a strong shudder. His mind seemed to be divided between horror at an inquest’s having to be held over any member of his family, and a shocked realization that he had come into Sussex quite improperly clad. His anxiety to put himself into mourning at once, coupled with a fear that Schultz, his tailor, might not be able to supply his needs in due time, formed the subjects of his breakfast table conversation and certainly hastened his departure. By ten o’clock his chaise was bowling away down the avenue and Carlyon was giving orders for his own carriage to be brought up to the house.

He and John drove to Highnoons to take up Nicky, and discovered this young gentleman to be almost completely restored to health, his spirits only damped by the thought of what lay before him. He smiled gratefully at John and said it was devilish good of him to have come down from London.

“Well, of course I have come!” John said severely. “If that is a sling you have hanging round your neck, put your arm in it and see you keep it there!”

“Oh, the wound scarcely troubles me at all! I don’t need the sling and only wear it to please Becky!” said Nicky, who had lost no time in getting upon terms with Miss Beccles.

“Very likely, but it will present a good appearance. I know these Sussex juries!”

“Yes, but I did not get hurt in that fight with Eustace!” objected Nicky.

“No need to say so unless you are asked, and then you will say you were wounded in repelling housebreakers,” said his cynical brother. “Either way will serve as well.”

He turned to shake Elinor warmly by the hand and to make his bow to Miss Beccles. Carlyon addressed some observation to Elinor. She replied to it and then, waiting in vain for any comment on her gray gown with its black ribbons and lace, rallied him with: “Well! You perceive, I trust, that I am gone into half-mourning at least! I expect to be heartily commended!”

“You look charmingly, ma’am,” he replied.

She was put out of countenance. “Oh, no, no, no! I was not asking to be complimented on my looks, but upon my docility!”

There was an amused expression in his eyes. He answered, however, with perfect gravity, “You forget that I have three sisters. I trust I have learned from them to avoid making such remarks as must be reckoned tactless in the extreme.”

She laughed out at that. “Well! It is very hard if I am not to be praised for showing myself so biddable! I received my Lord Bedlington yesterday in the most somber black imaginable. He has been with you, I think. Has he told you of his intention to stay at Highnoons for the funeral?”

“Yes, and I am aware that you have cause for complaint. Believe me, I did not intend you to undergo such hardship when I begged you to take up your residence here.”

“No! It quite spoils the tranquillity of my sojourn here!” she countered. “When all has been so agreeable until now!”

He smiled, but only said, “I trust your rest was undisturbed last night?”

“No such thing! Your brother’s odious dog scratched so vigorously at my door that I was obliged to get up out of my bed to let him in!”

“He must have taken a marked fancy to you, ma’am,” he said politely.

“He had a marked fancy for the ham bone he had laid under my bed!” she retorted.

He laughed. “Well, that is a great deal too bad, certainly, but never mind! I am relieving you of both him and my graceless brother.”

“Oh, no!” she exclaimed quickly. “No, pray, do not, sir! He is an excellent watch dog and gives me the greatest feeling of security! Only fancy! he would not allow the baker to come within fifty yards of the house!”

“What’s that?” Nicky demanded. “You will not make me go back to the Hall, yet, Ned! I am set on searching for that precious document, whatever it may be. Besides Cousin Elinor will not like to be left without Bouncer and you know he will never stay if I go.”

Both Elinor and Miss Beccles added their earnest entreaties to his and it was finally agreed that Nicky should return to Highnoons after the inquest. He naively informed his brother that he had found an attic stuffed with old lumber and meant to have a rare time poking about among the entrancing relics he had discovered there. “You can have no notion, Ned! There is an old pistol, I dare say as old as Queen Anne, and a couple of rapiers all rusted over, and I do not know what more besides!”

“Famous!” said John sardonically. “The very place where you would expect to find a state paper!”

“Well, as to that, there’s no saying where it might be, after all,” argued Nicky. “But only think, John! Do you remember that first-rate kite Eustace had and would never let Harry fly? I found it there under a heap of rubbish and recognized it on the instant!”

“No!” John exclaimed, much struck. “Why, it must be years old! I wonder you should remember it!”

“Oh, yes! it had red stripes! I could not forget!”

“Yes, that’s true. And a long tail which Harry snipped off when Eustace was so mean-spirited as to refuse to let him fly the thing! Well, upon my word!”

It began to seem as though rummaging amongst half-forgotten playthings, instead of attending an inquest, was to be the order of the day, but the two brothers were recalled to a sense of the occasion by Carlyon, and rather regretfully followed him out to the carriage. Miss Beccles softened the rebuke by suggesting that they should fly the kite later.

“By Jove, yes! Do let us, John!” Nicky exclaimed.

“Nonsense!” said John. “Kites, indeed! I wonder if it is as good as ever?”

The carriage drove away with them and the two ladies returned to their interrupted task of dragging all the books from their shelves in the library, clapping them together, dusting the covers, and restoring them to their places. It was exhausting work and the clouds of dust that thickened the air and made the ladies sneeze seemed to indicate that Eustace Cheviot had not been of a bookish turn of mind. Such extraneous matter as floated to the floor when the books were clapped plainly had been placed between the leaves by feminine hands. Several dried flowers were discovered, an old laundry list, and a recipe for making eel broth which Miss Beccles thought would be a sustaining diet for an invalid. But of state secrets there was no trace, and although Miss Beccles derived great satisfaction from knowing that no dust, cobwebs, or spiders any longer lurked on the shelves, Elinor could not but feel that she had been wasting her time.

They were just sitting down to a nuncheon of cold meat, fruit, and tea, when the Carlyon carriage once more pulled up at the front door and the three brothers alighted. Elinor ran out at once to inquire whether all were well, and was met by Nicky who called cheerfully, “They have not put me in irons, Cousin Elinor! The Crowner was a great gun! I had not thought it had all been so simple! To tell you the truth, I did not above half like the notion of having to give my evidence, but no one could have been more civil! I was soon feeling at home to a peg. And Hitchin spoke in bang-up style! It was brought in Accidental Death, and only fancy! half of the people who had crowded in to listen to the case set up a cheer! I can tell you I was glad to be able to jump up into the carriage and get away!”

“Oh, I am so heartily thankful!” Elinor cried. “It must have been so, of course, but one could not help being a little anxious.”

She put out her hand impulsively to Carlyon as she spoke and he shook it, saying, “Thank you. It is happily over, and did indeed go without the least rub.” He added, a smile in his eyes, “Judging from the demeanor of the spectators, it would have gone hard with the jury had they brought in another verdict! I was obliged to hustle Nicky away, for what must some of the villagers do but try to shake him by the hand as though he had been a public benefactor!”

“Well, it was improper, but one cannot wonder at it,” said John. “Cheviot left no stone unturned to render himself odious in these parts.”

She led them into the dining parlor and pressed them to partake of some cold meat. Nicky exclaimed, “What, mawdling your insides with tea again! No, I thank you!”

“Yes, indeed, it is very wrong to be drinking tea at such an hour as this,” confessed Miss Beccles. “But such an agreeable luxury!”

Happily for Nicky, Barrow had seen the carriage drive up to the house, and now brought a large jug of ale into the room, and three tankards. The gentlemen were thus able to enjoy a very tolerable luncheon, during which they discussed the inquest with the ladies, informed them what arrangements had been made for the funeral, and announced their intention of spending the afternoon at Highnoons to search for any secret document there might be there.

Carlyon’s part in the search was methodical and unhurried. For some time he was ably assisted by John, both brothers sitting in the bookroom, Carlyon before an antique commode whose drawers and cupboards were crammed with the accumulations of years, and John on the sofa with a battered wooden box at his feet, which one of Eustace’s keys had been found to fit. This was full of papers, old account books, ledgers, and bundles of letters, and these were all in such disorder that he was very glad to accept Elinor’s offer of assistance in sorting them out. But after half an hour’s steady work an interruption occurred. Nicky looked into the room, saying, “Look, is not this the very one, John?”

“Ay, that is it,” John replied, glancing up at the gaudy if somewhat faded kite he was being shown.

“Well, do you mean to come and try if it will fly?”

“Flying kites at my age! I should rather think not! Cannot you see that I am busy?”

“Oh, fusty work!” Nicky said, disappearing again.

John returned to his task, but happening to raise his head a few minutes later, caught sight of Nicky in the garden. His attention remained riveted, and he presently ejaculated, “One would fancy him a schoolboy! Incurable folly!”

Neither Carlyon nor Elinor returned any answer, and after a slight pause during which he continued to look out of the window he said testily, “That’s no way to go about it! Why does he not take it into the meadow? There cannot be wind enough in this hollow!”

“Here is a book of household accounts twenty years old,” said Elinor. “Shall I lay it aside to be burned?”

“Yes, certainly,” he said absently. “There! you have got it entangled in the hedge! Ned, that boy will be hurting his shoulder if he persists! I’ll go out to him!”

He left the room abruptly as he spoke, and five minutes later Elinor had an excellent view of him upon the lawn, arguing with Nicky. Both brothers then departed in the direction of the meadow, Bouncer at their heels, and were no more seen until the light began to fail and Carlyon had called for his carriage. They came in then, flushed and untidy, but full of satisfaction in having found the kite to be in famous shape, and very hot against their deceased cousin for the selfishness which had made him refuse to allow them to fly it years ago, when, as John rather unconvincingly said, they might really have enjoyed such a childish pastime. He looked a little conscious when he realized how late it was, and said that he begged pardon for having left his task. “But I thought I had best make sure Nicky did himself no injury,” he explained. “Besides, I don’t believe there is anything in this rubbish heap of a house but what had better have been burned years ago!”

“I begin to agree with you,” said Carlyon, ruefully regarding the huge pile of wastepaper on the floor. “Nevertheless, the work had to be done, and whether I find anything of value or not I must continue until it is finished. Mrs. Cheviot, I beg you will not exhaust yourself in this search! I shall return tomorrow, and there is not the least need for you to be turning out any more drawers and cupboards today.”

Both he and John took their leave of her, John saying that although he must return to London on the morrow he should try to be in Sussex to attend the funeral. As they left the house, Bouncer entered it, very much out of breath and generously plastered with mud. Miss Beccles uttered a shriek of dismay and ran at once for a cloth with which she proceeded to dry his legs and paws, scolding gently as she did so. Bouncer instantly assumed the cowed mien of a dog suffering under torture, but upon being released tore round the room three tunes at top speed, sending all the rugs flying, and ended up with a leap onto the sofa where he sat grinning and panting until turned off it by his master.

The night was uneventful. Upon the following morning, Carlyon came over at an early hour to Highnoons, and allowed himself to be lured up to the attic by Nicky, where he made a clearance which would have been even more drastic had not Miss Beccles trotted up with a plate of rout drop-cakes (for she believed that gentlemen stood in constant need of sustenance) and rescued from the pile on the floor several old-fashioned dresses whose stiff brocade, she assured Carlyon in scandalized accents, would cut up to admiration; a large pincushion; just such an earthenware bowl as Mrs. Barrow stood in crying need of; a paper full of pins, a little rusted, to be sure, but by no means useless; and a book of Household Hints which contained such valuable information as how to remove stains from linen by laying on salt of wormwood, and the infallibility of Scotch snuff as a means of destroying crickets.

While she was upstairs, Elinor went out into the garden, accompanied by Bouncer, to give some directions to the gardener, and was trying to convince him of the propriety of his devoting his time to weeding the overgrown carriage drive, when a job-chaise drove in at the gate. When it pulled up before the house a burly individual descended from it, with all the look about him of a tradesman. Elinor stepped forward to inquire his business, and was only just in time to prevent Bouncer’s seizing him by the calf of his leg. Ruffled by this reception, the visitor abandoned any attempt at civility, and thrust upon her a formidable and detailed account, which, he loudly asserted, he would have paid immediately or by distraint. Upon learning that his defaulting client lay dead, he looked greatly taken aback, but after a few seconds’ astonishment said that he was not surprised to hear it and would be paid in any event. The affronted widow recommended him to present his demand to Mr. Cheviot’s executors and when he seemed inclined to think she might well pay him a trifle on account, since he was a poor man and sadly out of pocket over the business, announced her inability any longer to control the dog. The visitor then mounted into his chaise again with more speed than dignity and Mrs. Cheviot went up to the attic to inform Carlyon, with no little relish, that just as she had always expected she was now being dunned at the door.

“Yes, I dare say this is but the first of many such encounters,” replied Carlyon. “A notice is to be inserted in the newspapers, but no doubt it will be missed by many.”

“Charming! So I must accustom myself to being abused at my own door!”

“I cannot understand why you should be answering your front doorbell,” said Carlyon. “Barrow is well able to deal with such persons.”

“But I was in the garden and naturally stepped up to the man to know what he might want!” said Elinor indignantly.

“Unwise. You will know better another time,” was all the satisfaction she obtained.

She was happily diverted by Miss Beccles’ displaying to her the glories of the brocade dresses she had rescued. “Oh, I can remember Mama in just such a dress!” she cried. “It should have a hoop, should it not, Becky? And the hair dressed high, with powder and a wreath or feathers or some such thing! I wonder how anyone can ever have borne to have worn such a garment! Only feel the weight of it! But the brocade is the very thing we need for the cushions in the parlor.” She looked round the attic, marveling at the collection of worn-out finery, furniture, and rubbish. “Good God, has everything that needed a stitch or a nail been cast into this garret?”

“Yes, indeed,” said Miss Beccles, shaking her head mournfully. “There has been a sad want of management and economy, I fear. And here is my lord refusing to let me keep back that chair from the bonfire, and all it needs is to have the seat recaned! And only look at that spit, too! I am sure it could be mended if only he would let me take it down to the kitchen.”

“You maytake it down, dear Becky,” said Elinor grandly. “You may save anything you like from the bonfire!”

“Oh, no, my love! If his lordship feels it were better to throw the things away, I would not think—”

“This,” said Elinor in a very lofty tone, “is my house, and you may tell his lordship that he has nothing to say in the matter!”

“Elinor, my love! Indeed, you let the liveliness of your mind betray you into saying what is not at all becoming!”

“Tell his lordship with your compliments,” corrected Carlyon. “You should always add your compliments to any message you wish to render excessively cutting.”

She cast him a withering glance and prepared to retreat in good order. To her surprise, he followed her out of the attic and downstairs, saying, “Your unwelcome visitor has put me in mind of something I should have spoken of before, Mrs. Cheviot. Shall we go into the parlor?”

“Now what horrid surprise do you mean to spring on me?” she asked suspiciously.

“On my honor, none at all! But it occurs to me that it will be proper for me, as my cousin’s executor, to advance you sufficient moneys to pay for all those items, I dare say a great many, which it may not be convenient to charge up.”

“No, pray do not! There can be not the least necessity!”

“On the contrary, you are not to be spending out of your own purse.”

“I shall not. Why, what should I spend money on?”

“Depend upon it, there will be a score of things.” He added with a slight smile, “At any moment a peddler may come to the door and you will buy a broom from him or a chintz patch or some such thing!”

“Well, if I do that is quite my own affair. I had rather you did not give me any money.”

“You are overscrupulous, ma’am, but since you have this extreme nicety I will place a sum in Miss Beccles’ charge.”

She almost stamped her foot at him. “I wish you will not treat me as though I were a schoolgirl, my lord!” she said. She read an answer in his eye, and added hurriedly, “And do not tell me that I behave as one, because it is quite untrue!”

“Certainly not. I know you to be a sensible woman, a little too much in the habit of having your own way.”

She fairly gasped. “This reproach from you, my lord!”

“Very true. We agreed, did we not, that my disposition is overbearing? But you will own that my way is in general more reasonable than yours.”

“Not while I still retain the possession of my faculties!” she declared. “Indeed, I do not know how you dare make such a claim! It quite takes my breath away! When I consider in what apposition you have placed me, and then am obliged to listen to you talking as though you had done nothing out of the ordinary, but on the contrary had acted in the best possible manner—”

“Well, you know, ma’am, given a situation which you will allow to have been excessively awkward, I think I did,” he said.

Mrs. Cheviot sank into a chair and covered her eyes with one hand.

Carlyon regarded her in some amusement. “Still regretting Mrs. Macclesfield, ma’am?”

“Oh, no! how could I, sir?” she retorted. “How dull I must have been in her house! I dare say she had never a French agent within it, let alone a distraint upon the furniture!”

“I am sure hers is a most respectable household. I should be surprised if her husband has ever done anything as mildly reprehensible as to look for a keg of brandy by his back door.” He broke off. “Yes, that puts me in mind of something else,” he said. “It is the season when we may reasonably expect to find a few such kegs. I am sure Eustace had his brandy from the free traders. If you should come upon any kegs in some unexpected place such as an outhouse, for instance, just tell me, ma’am! Do not raise an outcry!”

“This only was needed!” said Elinor. “I am now to enter into dealings with a pack of smugglers! Perhaps, after all, you had better leave some money with me, for I dare say they will wish to be paid for their trouble! And though, to be sure, life at Highnoons has been a trifle flat these past two days, I should not care to be at loggerheads with a set of desperate persons who would not, I dare say, boggle for an instant at murder!”

“Oh, I do not think they will murder you!” he replied cheerfully. “I will set the word going, however, in the proper quarters, that any consignment ordered by my cousin may be delivered up at the Hall.”

“And I have no doubt whatsoever,” stated Mrs.

Cheviot, “that you are a Justice of the Peace!”

“Yes, certainly.”

“I wonder you should not be ashamed to own it!” she said virtuously.

“My dear ma’am, there is nothing in the least derogatory in being a Justice of the Peace!” he replied, at his blandest.

Mrs. Cheviot sought in vain for words adequate to the occasion, and could only regard him in speechless dudgeon.