"Do you mean to turn from the error of your ways, and be a good husband, a good father, and so forth; as I do, when I get shut of you and all these rollicking devils you call your friends?
I think it's time; and your wife is fifty times too good for you, you know--" 'And he added some praise of you, which you would not thank me for repeating, nor him for uttering; proclaiming it aloud, as he did, without delicacy or discrimination, in an audience where it seemed profanation to utter your name: himself utterly incapable of understanding or appreciating your real excellences.

Huntingdon, meanwhile, sat quietly drinking his wine,--or looking smilingly into his glass and offering no interruption or reply, till Hattersley shouted out,--"Do you hear me, man ?" '"Yes, go on," said he.
'"Nay, I've done," replied the other: "I only want to know if you intend to take my advice." '"What advice ?" '"To turn over a new leaf, you double-dyed scoundrel," shouted Ralph, "and beg your wife's pardon, and be a good boy for the future." '"My wife! what wife?
I have no wife," replied Huntingdon, looking innocently up from his glass, "or if I have, look you, gentlemen: I value her so highly that any one among you, that can fancy her, may have her and welcome: you may, by Jove, and my blessing into the bargain!" 'I--hem--someone asked if he really meant what he said; upon which he solemnly swore he did, and no mistake.

What do you think of that, Mrs.
Huntingdon ?' asked Mr.Hargrave, after a short pause, during which I had felt he was keenly examining my half-averted face.
'I say,' replied I, calmly, 'that what he prizes so lightly will not be long in his possession.' 'You cannot mean that you will break your heart and die for the detestable conduct of an infamous villain like that!' 'By no means: my heart is too thoroughly dried to be broken in a hurry, and I mean to live as long as I can.' 'Will you leave him then ?' 'Yes.' 'When: and how ?' asked he, eagerly.
'When I am ready, and how I can manage it most effectually.' 'But your child ?' 'My child goes with me.' 'He will not allow it.' 'I shall not ask him.' 'Ah, then, it is a secret flight you meditate! but with whom, Mrs.
Huntingdon ?' 'With my son: and possibly, his nurse.' 'Alone--and unprotected! But where can you go?
what can you do?
He will follow you and bring you back.' 'I have laid my plans too well for that.

Let me once get clear of Grassdale, and I shall consider myself safe.' Mr.Hargrave advanced one step towards me, looked me in the face, and drew in his breath to speak; but that look, that heightened colour, that sudden sparkle of the eye, made my blood rise in wrath: I abruptly turned away, and, snatching up my brush, began to dash away at my canvas with rather too much energy for the good of the picture.
'Mrs.Huntingdon,' said he with bitter solemnity, 'you are cruel--cruel to me--cruel to yourself.' 'Mr.Hargrave, remember your promise.' 'I must speak: my heart will burst if I don't! I have been silent long enough, and you must hear me!' cried he, boldly intercepting my retreat to the door.

'You tell me you owe no allegiance to your husband; he openly declares himself weary of you, and calmly gives you up to anybody that will take you; you are about to leave him; no one will believe that you go alone; all the world will say, "She has left him at last, and who can wonder at it?
Few can blame her, fewer still can pity him; but who is the companion of her flight ?" Thus you will have no credit for your virtue (if you call it such): even your best friends will not believe in it; because it is monstrous, and not to be credited but by those who suffer, from the effects of it, such cruel torments that they know it to be indeed reality.