Lady Joseline was Mary Foley once more, and her heart was too sore for even Tito’s sympathy, as she lay on her bed sobbing. She wished herself back at the Corner; she went even further--she wished herself _dead_. * * * * * Dudley took but scant notice of his new cousin; in fact, he avoided her, and maintained a sort of studied aloofness, determined not to be associated with ridicule. He was fastidious, and easily influenced by a woman like Mrs. Folly Fullerton, who did not see anything to admire in Joseline, and made fun of her continually. Dudley, shameful to say, drifted with the stream, too indolent to swim against it. Poor Joseline seemed to find so many adversaries among the company; she became shy and awkward when people addressed her, and appeared to have a genius for saying and doing the wrong thing. She was, moreover, downright unlucky; she knocked down and broke a piece of china, value untold. And Rap had nearly been the death of Lady Mulgrave’s little dog, which he in the heat of the moment had chased, shaken, and mistaken for a rat. Some of her miseries were possibly due to imagination. She was painfully sensitive, and believed the whole of this little world was against her. Certainly she made a few blunders, and two enemies. For instance, one evening, at dessert, there was an animated discussion respecting the conduct of a certain married lady, whose case had been recently in the papers. Her letters had been read to the wide world; her husband had vainly sued for a divorce. Some blamed her, others merely laughed. “Why, I declare Lady Joseline looks shocked,” said Colonel Wildairs, in a loud, full voice, which would have been a fortune to an orator. “She is not used to the manners and ways of such society, eh?” “No, thank goodness, I am not,” she answered, with decision. “Are you Irish so particular?” “Among the lower orders--yes. I do not know the other lot; they may be as bad as yourselves, but the common people have conduct, and they _have_ to behave themselves. I knew a girl--a married woman--and her husband thought she was speaking too free to a young boy, and he punished her proper.” “How?” inquired Miss Tripp, leaning forward as she spoke. “Do tell us how he punished her ‘proper’ for improper behaviour.” “Well, he tied her up by her two hands in the cowhouse, and he bet her with a car-whip till he could stand over her no longer, and she was half-killed. I heard the screeches of her myself, and it served her right.” “You think so?” said Lady Boxhill sarcastically. “Certainly, and to be sure I do. What does a married woman want with a sweetheart? Will ye tell me?” Here she inadvertently fixed her eyes upon Lady Towton, and the question seemed to be shot at her from the girl’s impetuous lips.