is meaning, which was, that he would have me define something like an
allowance to my father, not so much for the purpose of curtailing his
expenditure--he did not venture upon private ground--as to bridle my
father's ideas of things possible for a private gentleman in this
country. In that character none were like him. As to his suit, or appeal,
he could assure me that Serjeant Wedderburn, and all who would or could
speak on the subject, saw no prospect of success; not any. The worst of
it was, that it caused my father to commit himself in sundry ways. It
gave a handle to his enemies. It--he glanced at me indicatively.

I thanked the well-meaning gentleman without encouraging him to continue.

'It led him to perform once more as a Statue of Bronze before the whole
of gaping London!' I could have added. That scene on the pine-promontory
arose in my vision, followed by other scenes of the happy German days. I
had no power to conjure up the princess.

Jorian DeWitt was the man I wanted to see. After applications at his Club
and lodgings I found him dragging his Burgundy leg in the Park, on his
road to pay a morning visit to his fair French enchantress. I impeached
him, and he pleaded guilty, clearly not wishing to take me with him, nor
would he give me Mlle. Jenny's address, which I had. By virtue of the
threat that I would accompany him if he did not satisfy me, I managed to
extract the story of the Dauphin, aghast at the discovery of its being
true. The fatal after-dinner speech he believed to have been actually
spoken, and he touched on that first. 'A trap was laid for him, Harry
Richmond; and a deuced clever trap it was. They smuggled in special
reporters. There wasn't a bit of necessity for the toast. But the old
vixen has shown her hand, so now he must fight. He can beat her
single-handed on settees. He'll find her a tartar at long bowls: she
sticks at nothing. She blazes out, that he scandalizes her family. She
has a dozen indictments against him. You must stop in town and keep
watch. There's fire in my leg to explode a powder-magazine a mile off!'

'Is it the Margravine of Rippau?' I inquired. I could think of no other
waspish old woman.

'Lady Dane,' said Jorian. 'She set Edbury on to face him with the
Dauphin. You don't fancy it came of the young dog "all of himself," do
you? Why, it was clever! He trots about a briefless little barrister, a
scribbler, devilish clever and impudent, who does his farces for him