said Lady Mabel, some days after the morning on which
L'Isle found her at home alone, "I was neither so good an actress, nor
so great a hypocrite as you took me for. My offence was not so much
that I simulated, as that I ceased to dissemble."

L'Isle readily embraced the faith that she was no actress but a true
woman, nor did he ever waver from it. But she did not always find so
easy a convert. Old Moodie, true to his nature, baffled all her
efforts to convince him of his errors. It is true that he became in
time, somewhat reconciled to L'Isle, but to his dying day he continued
to laud that special providence, which had snatched Lady Mabel from
the land of idolatry, at the very last moment before her perversion to
Rome.

Lady Mabel was not the woman to forget old friends; and now, that she
could recur with pleasure to her recollections of Elvas, she sought
out that companion who had so amiably filled the part of duenna and
chaperon. She and Mrs. Shortridge fought all their battles over again,
by retracing, step by step, varied excursions and toilsome journey,
while enjoying all the comforts of an English home. But it never does
to tell all that we do, still less, to lay open the spirit in which we
do it. Lady Mabel never let Mrs. Shortridge fully into the secret
history of the last dark treacherous scene in the episode in winter
quarters.

Lord Strathern was much pleased to find that L'Isle had greatly
modified his opinion, as to the mechanical nature of an army, and
hoped in time to dispel certain other erroneous notions, to which he
had formerly clung so stubbornly. It is not known whether or not
L'Isle ever finished his narrative of the Peninsular campaigns. It is
certain that he never published it. The author often labors harder
than the ploughman; and when a man is made happy, he becomes lazy. Let
the wretched toil to mend his lot, or to forget it.

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ACTRESS IN HIGH LIFE***

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