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 you be, nor whether you be rebel or highwayman; but ’tis best that you should leave this house.”

“What!” said I, “and her ladyship there who is to wed with me?”

She turned her head sharply from me, but then, coming back again, made as if to speak once more; but at this point her ladyship broke in.

“O Lord, sis,” she cried, “give me joy. Faith, and you must guess. Who is’t, d’ye suppose, save the faithless Malvern, the dear rogue!”

“Why, what is this?” I asked, for there was that about her show of excitement that made me wonder. But she took no heed of me, and went on crying out in terms of unaccustomed gladness about this “devoted wretch,” and this “dear villain,” and declared that her hair was all awry, and that she would never be fit more to receive a chairman.

I was not to pass all this in silence, as you may imagine, and so I broke in sharply: “Your ladyship” said I; but ere I could get two