lwind of disastrous imprecations cut all short; and then in a
voice choked with passion he gasped out--

"But--but are they married--are they married? how do you know it? can't
we catch 'em first, ey? what!"

"How do I know it? that's a good un now, father, when I had it under
your hand to give the girl away myself instead of you. Do you mean to
say you didn't write that letter?"

"Boy, I tell you, I've written nothing--I know nothing; you speak in
riddles."

"Well then, governor, if I do, I'll to guess 'em: I begin to see how it
was all brought about--but they did it cleverly too, and were quite too
many for me. Only listen: that fellow Clements, ay, and Miss Maria too
(artful minx, I know her), must have forged a letter as if from you to
get poor fools, me and my mother, to see 'em spliced, while you were
tooling to Yorkshire."

"Impossible--ey? what? I'll--I'll--I'll--"

"Now, governor, don't stand there doing nothing but denying all I say;
only you go yourself, and ask my mother if she didn't see the letter--if
they didn't marry upon it, and if that precious sister of mine doesn't
richly deserve every thing she'll some day get from her affectionate,
her excellent, her ill-used father?"

Iago's self, or his master, smooth-tongued Belial, could not have
managed matters better.

The incredulous knight, scarcely able to discover how far it might not
still be all a joke, especially after his Yorkshire expedition, rushed
up to Lady Dillaway; on her usual sofa, quietly knitting, and thinking
of her Maria's second day of happiness.

"So, ma'am--ey? what? is it true? are they married? is it true?
married--ey? what?"

"Certainly, Thomas, they were only too glad, and I will add, so was I,
to get your kind--"

"Mine? I give leave? ey? what? Madam, we're cheated, fooled--I never
wrote any letter."

"Most astonishing; I saw it myself, Thomas, your own hand; and our dear
John too."

"Ay, ay--he sees through it all, and so do I now--ey? what? that
precious pair of rogues forged it! Now, ma'am, what don't they deserve,
I should like to know?"

It was quite a blow, and a very hard one, to the poor tranquil mother.
Could her dear Maria really have been so base, and that noble-looking
Henry too? how dreadfully deceived in them, if this proved true! And how
could she think it false? A letter contrived to expedite their marriage
in the father's casual absence, which no one could have thought of
writing but Sir Thomas