"Hardly, sir," laughed she.
"If you knew her as I do." "I ought to know her better, sir." "Ay, indeed! Well, madam, now her kindness to me, for instance--a poor devil like me.

The expression, I trust, is not disagreeable to you, madam?
If so, forgive me, and consider it withdrawn." "La, sir! civility is so cheap, if you go to that." "Civility, ma'am?
Why, she has saved me from despair--from starvation, perhaps." "Poor thing! Well, indeed, sir, you looked--you looked--what a shame! and you a poet." "From an epitaph to an epic, madam." At this moment a figure looked in upon them from the garden, but retreated unobserved.

It was Sir Charles Pomander, who had slipped away, with the heartless and malicious intention of exposing the husband to the wife, and profiting by her indignation and despair.

Seeing Triplet, he made an extemporaneous calculation that so infernal a chatterbox could not be ten minutes in her company without telling her everything, and this would serve his turn very well.

He therefore postponed his purpose, and strolled away to a short distance.
Triplet justified the baronet's opinion.