My apologies to you, sir." I bowed to him civilly again, and passed on; but as I knocked upon Mr.
Fenwick's door, I saw that he was staring after me, from the entrance to that same passage from which he had come.
* * * * * My second adventure was that, upon coming upstairs, I found that in the chamber with Mr.Fenwick were the mother and sister of Mr.Ireland, waiting for him to come and take them back to their lodging.

They were quiet folks enough--a little shy, it appeared to me, of strange company.
But I did my best to be civil, and they grew more talkative.

Mrs.
Ireland would be near sixty years old, I would take it, dressed in a brown sac, such as had been fashionable ten years back, and her daughter, I should think about thirty years old.

They told me that they had been to supper, and to the play in the Duke's Playhouse, where Mr.
Shirley's tragi-comedy _The Young Admiral_ had been done; and that Mr.
Ireland was to come for them here, as presently he did, for it was scarce safe for ladies to be abroad at such an hour in the streets without an escort, so wild were the pranks played (and worse than pranks), by even the King's gentlemen themselves, as well as by the riff-raff.
We sat and talked a good while; and Mr.Grove brought chocolate up for the ladies.

But for myself, I had such a variety of thoughts, as I talked with them all, knowing what I did, and they knowing nothing, that I could scarce command my voice and manner sometimes.