shamed and confounded to be discovered in
this situation; but, as you have overheard what passed between
Mademoiselle and me, I know you will do justice to my intention, and
forgive my mistake. After begging pardon for having intruded upon your
family at these hours, I must now tell you that my cousin, Count Melvil,
was some time ago so much misrepresented to his mother by certain
malicious informers, who delight in sowing discord in private families,
that she actually believed her son an extravagant spendthrift, who had
not only consumed his remittances in the most riotous scenes of disorder,
but also indulged a pernicious appetite for gaming, to such a degree,
that he had lost all his clothes and jewels at play. In consequence of
such false information, she expostulated with him in a severe letter, and
desired he would transmit to her that ring which is in your custody, it
being a family stone, for which she expressed an inestimable value. The
young gentleman, in his answer to her reproof, endeavoured to vindicate
himself from the aspersions which had been cast upon his character, and,
with regard to the ring, told her it was at present in the hands of a
jeweller, in order to be new set according to her own directions, and
that, whenever it should be altered, he would send it home to her by some
safe conveyance. This account the good lady took for an evasion, and
upon that supposition has again written to him, in such a provoking
style, that, although the letter arrived but half an hour ago, he is
determined to despatch a courier before morning with the mischievous
ring, for which, in compliance with the impetuosity of his temper, I have
taken the freedom to disturb you at this unseasonable hour."

The German paid implicit faith to every circumstance of his story, which
indeed could not well be supposed to be invented extempore; the ring was
immediately restored, and our adventurer took his leave, congratulating
himself upon his signal deliverance from the snare in which he had
fallen.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

THE STEP-DAME'S SUSPICIONS BEING AWAKENED, SHE LAYS A SNARE FOR OUR
ADVENTURER, FROM WHICH HE IS DELIVERED BY THE INTERPOSITION OF HIS GOOD
GENIUS.

Though the husband swallowed the bait without further inquiry, the
penetration of the wife was not so easily deceived. That same dialogue
in Wilhelmina's apartment, far from allaying, rather inflamed her
suspicion; because, in the like emergency, she her