mposure; and on those occasions when, the traffic being
interrupted, the oratorical powers were useful to fill up the time, she
shone with singular brilliance. The West End is too often in debt to
the City, but, in the matter of chaff, it was not so this day; for
whenever she took a peck she returned a bushel; and so she rattled to
the door of Solomon Oldfield, solicitor, Old Jewry.

She penetrated into the inner office of that worthy, and told him he
must come with her that minute to Portman Square.

"Impossible, madam!" And, as they say in the law reports, gave his
reasons.

"Certain, sir!" And gave no reasons.

He still resisted.

Thereupon she told him she should sit there all day and chaff his
clients one after another, and that his connection with the Bassett and
Huntercombe estates should end.

Then he saw he had to do with a termagant, and consented, with a sigh.

She drove him westward, wincing every now and then at her close
driving, and told him all, and showed him what she was pleased to call
her little game. He told her it was too romantic. Said he, "You ladies
read nothing but novels; but the real world is quite different from the
world of novels." Having delivered this remonstrance--which was
tolerably just, for she never read anything but novels and sermons--he
submitted like a lamb, and received her instructions.

She drove as fast as she talked, so that by this time they were at
Admiral Bruce's door.

Now Mr. Oldfield took the lead, as per instructions. "Mr. Oldfield,
solicitor, and a lady--on business."

The porter delivered this to the footman with the accuracy which all
who send verbal messages deserve and may count on. "Mr. Oldfield and
lady."

The footman, who represented the next step in oral tradition, without
which form of history the Heathen world would never have known that
Hannibal softened the rocks with vinegar, nor the Christian world that
eleven thousand virgins dwelt in a German town the size of Putney,
announced the pair as "Mr. and Mrs. Hautville."

"I don't know them, I think. Well, I will see them."

They entered, and the admiral stared a little, and wondered how this
couple came together--the keen but plain old man, with clothes hanging
on him, and the dashing beauty, with her dress in the height of the
fashion, and her gauntleted hands. However, he bowed ceremoniously, and
begged his visitors to be seated.

Now the folding-doors were ajar, and the _soi-disant_ Mr