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Rh with us as you will! I would rather, ever so much rather, die with him than lose him now!"

Alfred was already beginning to fumble fiercely in his breast-pocket. Peter felt the time had arrived for plain speaking; he could not submit to be butchered under a ridiculous misapprehension of this kind.

"Listen to me!" he said eagerly, "before you do anything rash, or you may bitterly regret it afterwards. I do assure you that I am the victim—we are all the victims of a series of unfortunate cheques—I should say, mistakes. It's absurd to make me responsible for the irregular proceedings of a nonsensical Bank. If I had spent my time as I ought to have done at the time, instead of putting it out on deposit, I should never have dreamed of employing it in any kind of philandering!"

"That," said Sophia, "is undeniable: but you spent it as you ought not to have done!"

"Such a speech comes ill from you," he said, reproachfully, "after having expressly condoned the past; and, however I may have appeared to philander, I can conscientiously