it to
Mr. Rolfe, and will carry the reader forward beyond the date we have
now arrived at.

It was the little dining-room at Highmore; a low room, of modest size,
plainly furnished. An enormous fire-place, paved with plain tiles, on
which were placed iron dogs; only wood and roots were burned in this
room.

Mrs. Bassett had just been packed off to bed by marital authority;
Bassett and Wheeler sat smoking pipes and sipping whisky-and-water.
Bassett professed to like the smell of peat smoke in whisky; what he
really liked was the price.

After a few silent whiffs, said Bassett, "I didn't think they would
take it so quietly; did you?"

"Well, I really did not. But, after all, what can they do? They are
evidently afraid to go to the Court of Chancery, and ask for a jury in
the asylum; and what else can they do?"

"Humph! They might arrange an escape, and hide him for fourteen days;
then we could not recapture him without fresh certificates; could we?"

"Certainly not."

"And the doors would be too well guarded; not a crack for two doctors
to creep in at."

"You go too fast. _You_ know the law from me, and you are a daring man
that would try this sort of thing; but a timid woman, advised by a
respectable muff like Oldfield! They will never dream of such a thing."

"Oldfield is not her head-man. She has got another adviser, and he is
the very man to do something plucky."

"I don't know who you mean."

"Why, her lover, to be sure."

"Her lover? Lady Bassett's lover!"

"Ay, the young parson."

Wheeler smiled satirically. "You certainly are a good hater. Nothing is
too bad for those you don't like. If that Lady Bassett is not a true
wife, where will you find one?"

"She is the most deceitful jade in England."

"Oh! oh!"

"Ah! you may sneer. So you have forgotten how she outwitted us. Did the
devil himself ever do a cunninger thing than that? tempting a fellow
into a correspondence that seemed a piece of folly on her part, yet it
was a deep diabolical trick to get at my handwriting. Did _you_ see her
game? No more than I did. You chuckled at her writing letters to the
plaintiff _pendente lite._ We were both children, setting our wits
against a woman's. I tell you I dread her, especially when I see her so
unnaturally quiet, after what we have done. When you hook a large
salmon, and he makes a great commotion, but all of a sudden lies like a
stone, be on your guard; he means mischief."

"Well," said Wheele