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29, 1860.] Reverend.’ We deprive all renegades of their spiritual titles. His worldly ones let him keep!”

Her superb disdain nettled the Countess.

“Dear Harriet!” she said, with less languor, “You are utterly and totally and entirely mistaken. I tell you so positively. Renegade! The application of such a word to such a man! Oh! and it is false, Harriet: quite! Renegade means one who has gone over to the Turks, my dear. I am most certain I saw it in Johnson’s Dictionary, or an improvement upon Johnson, by a more learned author. But there is the fact, if Harriet can only bring her—shall I say stiff-necked prejudices to envisage it?”

Harriet granted her sister permission to apply the phrases she stood in need of without impeaching her intimacy with the most learned among lexicographers.

“And there is such a thing as being too severe,” the Countess resumed. “What our enemies call unchristian!”

“Mr. Duffian has no cause to complain of us,” said Harriet.

“Nor does he do so, dearest. Calumny may assail him; you may utterly denude him—”

“Adam!” interposed Andrew, distractedly listening. He did not disturb the Countess’s flow.

“You may vilify and victimise Mr. Duffian, and strip him of the honours of his birth, but, like the Martyrs, he will still continue the perfect nobleman. Stoned, I assure you that Mr. Duffian would preserve his breeding.”

“Eh? like tomatas?” quoth Andrew, in the same fit of distraction, and to the same deaf audience.

“I suppose his table is good?” said Harriet, almost ruffled by the Countess’s lecture.

“Plate,” was remarked, in the cold tone of supreme indifference.

“Hem! good wines?” Andrew asked, waking up a little, and not wishing to be excluded altogether.

“All is of the very best,” the Countess pursued her eulogy, not looking at him.

“Don’t you think you could—eh, Harry?—manage a pint for me, my dear?” Andrew humbly petitioned. “This cold water—ha! ha! my stomach don’t like cold bathing.”

His wretched joke rebounded from the impenetrable armour of the ladies.

“The wine-cellar is locked,” said his wife. “I have sealed up the key till an inventory can be taken by some agent of the creditors.”

“What creditors?” roared Andrew.

“You can have some of the servants’ beer,” Mrs. Cogglesby appended.

Andrew studied her face to see whether she really was not hoisting him with his own petard. Perceiving that she was sincerely acting according to her sense of principle, he fumed, and departed to his privacy, unable to stand it any longer.

Then like a kite the Countess pounced upon his character. Would the Honourable and Reverend Mr. Duffian decline to participate in the sparest provender? Would he be guilty of the discourtesy of leaving table without a bow or an apology, even if reduced to extremest poverty? No, indeed! which showed that, under all circumstances, a gentleman was a gentleman. And, oh! how she pitied her poor Harriet—eternally tied to a most vulgar little man, without the gilding of wealth.

“And a fool in his business to boot, dear!”

“These comparisons do no good,” said Harriet. “Andrew at least is not a renegade, and never shall be while I live. I will do my duty by him, however poor we are. And now, Louisa, putting my husband out of the question, what are your intentions? I don’t understand bankruptcy, but I imagine they can do nothing to wife and children. My little ones must have a roof over their heads; and, besides, there is little Maxwell. You decline to go down to Lymport, of course.”

“Decline!” cried the Countess, melodiously; “and do not you?”

“As far as I am concerned—yes. But I am not to think of myself.”

The Countess meditated, and said: “Dear Mr. Duffian has offered me his hospitality. Renegades are not absolutely inhuman. They may be generous. I have no moral doubt that Mr. Duffian would, upon my representation—dare I venture?”

“Sleep in his house! break bread with him!” exclaimed Harriet. “What do you think I am made of? I would perish—go to the workhouse, rather!”

“I see you trooping there,” said the Countess, intent on the vision.

“And have you accepted his invitation for yourself, Louisa?”

The Countess was never to be daunted by threatening aspects. She gave her affirmative with calmness and a deliberate smile.

“You are going to live with him?”

“Live with him! What expressions! My husband accompanies me.”

Harriet drew up.

“I know nothing, Louisa, that could give me more pain.”

The Countess patted Harriet’s knee. “It succeeds to bankruptcy, assuredly. But would you have me drag Silva to the—the shop, Harriet, love? Alternatives!”

Mrs. Andrew got up and rang the bell to have the remains of their dinner removed. When this was done, she said,—

“Louisa, I don’t know whether I am justified: you told me to-day I might keep my jewels, trinkets, and lace, and such like. To me, I know they do not belong now: but I will dispose of them to procure you an asylum somewhere—they will fetch I should think, 400l., to prevent your going to Mr. Duffian.”

No exhibition of great mindedness which the Countess could perceive, ever found her below it.

“Never, love, never!” she said.

“Then, will you go to Evan?”

“Evan? I hate him!” The olive-hued visage was dark. It brightened as she added, “At least as much as my religious sentiments permit me to. A boy who has thwarted me at every turn!—disgraced us! Indeed, I find it difficult to pardon you the supposition of such a possibility as your own consent to look on him ever again, Harriet.”

“You have no children,” said Mrs. Andrew.