eating
a halfpenny bun for an hour in the back shop (if that paradise may be
called a shop)--a lady stepped forward, laid down the Morning Herald,
and confronted him.

That lady was Mrs. Gashleigh. From that day the miserable Fitzroy was in
her power; and she resumed a sway over his house, to shake off which had
been the object of his life, and the result of many battles. And for a
mere freak--(for, on going into Fubsby's a week afterwards he found the
Peris drinking tea out of blue cups, and eating stale bread and butter,
when his absurd passion instantly vanished)--I say, for a mere freak,
the most intolerable burden of his life was put on his shoulders
again--his mother-in-law.

On the day before the little dinner took place--and I promise you
we shall come to it in the very next chapter--a tall and elegant
middle-aged gentleman, who might have passed for an earl but that there
was a slight incompleteness about his hands and feet, the former being
uncommonly red, and the latter large and irregular, was introduced to
Mrs. Timmins by the page, who announced him as Mr. Truncheon.

"I'm Truncheon, Ma'am," he said, with a low bow.

"Indeed!" said Rosa.

"About the dinner M'm, from Fubsby's, M'm. As you have no butler, M'm,
I presume you will wish me to act as sich. I shall bring two persons
as haids to-morrow; both answers to the name of John. I'd best, if you
please, inspect the premisis, and will think you to allow your young man
to show me the pantry and kitching."

Truncheon spoke in a low voice, and with the deepest and most respectful
melancholy. There is not much expression in his eyes, but from what
there is, you would fancy that he was oppressed by a secret sorrow. Rosa
trembled as she surveyed this gentleman's size, his splendid appearance,
and gravity. "I am sure," she said, "I never shall dare to ask him
to hand a glass of water." Even Mrs. Gashleigh, when she came on the
morning of the actual dinner-party, to superintend matters, was cowed,
and retreated from the kitchen before the calm majesty of Truncheon.

And yet that great man was, like all the truly great--affable.

He put aside his coat and waistcoat (both of evening cut, and looking
prematurely splendid as he walked the streets in noonday), and did not
disdain to rub the glasses and polish the decanters, and to show young
Buttons the proper mode of preparing these articles for a dinner. And
while he operated, the maids, and Buttons, and cook