Augusta, as we have said, bore it well, and sustained the public gaze without much flinching.
Her period of martyrdom, however, did not last long, for soon the news arrived of Frank's exploit in Pall Mall; and then the Greshamsburyites forgot to think much more of Augusta, being fully occupied in thinking of what Frank had done.
The tale, as it was first told, declared that Frank had followed Mr Moffat up into his club; had dragged him thence into the middle of Pall Mall, and had then slaughtered him on the spot.

This was by degrees modified till a sobered fiction became generally prevalent, that Mr Moffat was lying somewhere, still alive, but with all his bones in a general state of compound fracture.

This adventure again brought Frank into the ascendant, and restored to Mary her former position as the Greshamsbury heroine.
"One cannot wonder at his being very angry," said Beatrice, discussing the matter with Mary--very imprudently.
"Wonder--no; the wonder would have been if he had not been angry.

One might have been quite sure that he would have been angry enough." "I suppose it was not absolutely right for him to beat Mr Moffat," said Beatrice, apologetically.
"Not right, Trichy?
I think he was very right." "Not to beat him so very much, Mary!" "Oh, I suppose a man can't exactly stand measuring how much he does these things.

I like your brother for what he has done, and I say so frankly--though I suppose I ought to eat my tongue out before I should say such a thing, eh, Trichy ?" "I don't know that there's any harm in that," said Beatrice, demurely.