other gallants from town."

"At dice quotha? And she's gone, you say?" asked Mrs. Quinn, pausing in
her labours squarely to face her husband.

"Aye," said he.

"Stupid!" rejoined his docile spouse, vexed by his laconic assent. "Do
you mean she has run away?"

"Tis what anyone might take from what I have told you," he answered
sweetly.

"And you have lent her horses and helped her to get away, and you leave
her husband at play in there?"

"You have seen her marriage lines, I make no doubt," he sneered
irrelevantly.

"You dolt! If the gentleman horsewhips you, you will have richly earned
it."

"Eh? What?" gasped he, and his rubicund cheeks lost something of their
high colour, for here was a possibility that had not entered into his
calculations. But Mistress Quinn stayed not to answer him. Already she
was making for the door, wiping the dough from her hands on to her apron
as she went. A suspicion of her purpose flashed through her husband's
mind.

"What would you do?" he inquired nervously.

"Tell the gentleman what has taken place."

"Nay," he cried, resolutely barring her way. "Nay. That you shall not.
Would you--would you ruin me?"

She gave him a look of contempt, and dodging his grasp she gained the
door and was half-way down the passage towards the common room before he
had overtaken her and caught her round the middle.

"Are you mad, woman?" he shouted. "Will you undo me?"

"Do you undo me," she bade him, snatching at his hands. But he clutched
with the tightness of despair.

"You shall not go," he swore. "Come back and leave the gentleman to
make the discovery for himself. I dare swear it will not afflict him
overmuch. He has abandoned her sorely since they came; not a doubt of
it but that he is weary of her. At least he need not know I lent her
horses. Let him think she fled a-foot, when he discovers her departure."

"I will go," she answered stubbornly, dragging him with her a yard or
two nearer the door. "The gentleman shall be warned. Is a woman to run
away from her husband in my house, and the husband never be warned of
it?"

"I promised her," he began.

"What care I for your promises?" she asked. "I will tell him, so that he
may yet go after her and bring her back."

"You shall not," he insisted, gripping her more closely. But at that
moment a delicately mocking voice greeted their ears.

"Marry, 'tis vastly diverting to hear you," it said. They looked round,
to find one of the p