Mr. Hughes reflected, and spoke as one whose reflections had borne fruit. "Not being a married beggar myself, I can't say. Speaking as a single cuss, my recommendation to you would be--speaking broadly--not to make an Ass of yourself. See what I'm driving at?" "That means," said Mr. Aiken, "that you consider I ought to go and beg Euphemia's gracious pardon, and take the blame of the whole how-do-you-do on my own shoulders, and as like as not have to go to Church with Aunt Priscilla. Well--I won't, and there's an end of it!" And Mr. Aiken didn't, and prolonged his uncomfortable circumstances quite to the end of the year. But it is only right to say that his wife contributed all her share to their extension and consolidation. In fact, if this story has achieved the wish of its compiler, ourself, it should be clear to its reader that Mr. Reginald and Mrs. Euphemia Aiken were precisely six of the one and half a dozen of the other. CHAPTER VII The Upwell family in London. How Madeline promised not to get mixed up. A nice suburban boy, with a Two-Power Standard. No Jack now! The silver teapot. Miss Priscilla's extraction. Imperialism. Horace Walpole and John Bunyan. The Tapleys. How an item in the _Telegraph_ upset Madeline. How she failed in her mission, but left a photograph behind her. The late Lady Betty Dusters's chin. How Mrs. Aiken stayed downstairs and went to sleep in an arm-chair, and of a curious experience she had. How she related the same to her cousin Volumnia. Of Icilia Ciaranfi and Donnina Magliabecchi, and of The Dust. The Psychomorphic Report. How Miss Volumnia did not lose her train. "_Why_ do you want the carriage, darling?" "To call on a lady somewhere near Richmond, or Combe, I think it is." "Won't it do to-morrow?" "Not so well as to-day." "Then I suppose you _must_ have it, darling." "Not if you want it, Mumsey!" The speaker got the head of the person she addressed in Chancery, to kiss it, using the chair-back of the latter as a fulcrum. Lady Upwell, the victim of this manoeuvre, said, "Take care, Mad dear; you'll spoil my _ruche_ and put your eyes out." So her daughter released her, and sat at her feet. She had on her tussore in saxe-blue, trimmed with guipure lace, and was as pretty as ever, and as sad. "_Who_ is it you want to go and see, darling?" said her ladyship. "That Mrs. Aiken," said Madeline. "Oh," said her mother, "but isn't she rather?" But Madeline shook her head, with her eyes very wide open, and kept on shaking it all the while as she replied, "Oh no, she's not rather at all. It was all her husband." Whereupon her mother said, "Oh--it was her husband, was it?" and put back a loose lock of hair on her daughter's forehead that was getting in her eyes.