ed
the trouble of the contest. But it was not so with the Dean. "He is no
more Popenjoy than I am Popenjoy," said the Dean to himself when he
read the letter. Yes; he must go up to town again. He must know what
had really taken place between the two brothers. That was essential,
and he did not doubt but that he should get the exact truth from Lord
George. But he would not go to Munster Court. There was already a
difference of opinion between him and his son-in-law sufficient to make
such a sojourn disagreeable. If not disagreeable to himself, he knew
that it would be so to Lord George. He was sorry to vex Mary, but
Mary's interests were more at his heart than her happiness. It was now
the business of his life to make her a Marchioness, and that business
he would follow whether he made himself, her, and others happy or
unhappy. He wrote to her, bidding her tell her husband that he would
again be in London on a day which he named, but adding that for the
present he would prefer going to the hotel. "I cannot help it," said
Lord George moodily. "I have done all I could to make him welcome here.
If he chooses to stand off and be stiff he must do so."

At this time Lord George had many things to vex him. Every day he
received at his club a letter from Mrs. Houghton, and each letter was a
little dagger. He was abused by every epithet, every innuendo, and
every accusation familiar to the tongues and pens of the irritated
female mind. A stranger reading them would have imagined that he had
used all the arts of a Lothario to entrap the unguarded affections of
the writer, and then, when successful, had first neglected the lady and
afterwards betrayed her. And with every stab so given there was a
command expressed that he should come instantly to Berkeley Square in
order that he might receive other and worse gashes at the better
convenience of the assailant. But as Mrs. Bond's ducks would certainly
not have come out of the pond had they fully understood the nature of
that lady's invitation, so neither did Lord George go to Berkeley
Square in obedience to these commands. Then there came a letter which
to him was no longer a little dagger, but a great sword,--a sword
making a wound so wide that his life-blood seemed to flow. There was no
accusation of betrayal in this letter. It was simply the broken-hearted
wailings of a woman whose love was too strong for her. Had he not
taught her to regard him as the only man in the world whose p