On their return to the city, immediately on reaching their lodgings, Mrs.Starbottle announced her intention of at once proceeding to Mrs.Culpepper's to bring the child home.

Colonel Starbottle, who had been exhibiting for some time a certain uneasiness which he had endeavored to overcome by repeated stimulation, finally buttoned his coat tightly across his breast, and after walking unsteadily once or twice up and down the room, suddenly faced his wife with his most imposing manner.
"I have deferred," said the colonel with an exaggeration of port that increased with his inward fear, and a growing thickness of speech--"I have deferr--I may say poshponed statement o' fack thash my duty ter dishclose ter ye.

I did no wish to mar sushine mushal happ'ness, to bligh bud o' promise, to darken conjuglar sky by unpleasht revelashun.
Musht be done--by God, m'm, musht do it now.

The chile is gone!" "Gone!" echoed Mrs.Starbottle.
There was something in the tone of her voice, in the sudden drawing-together of the pupils of her eyes, that for a moment nearly sobered the colonel, and partly collapsed his chest.
"I'll splain all in a minit," he said with a deprecating wave of the hand.

"Everything shall be splained.