Captain Hulbert and Allegra went on with their animated discussion as to the author of “Macbeth” and “Hamlet;” and Captain Pentreath took up the thread of his story about the obstinate pike; Alicia talked to the doctor about her last day with the hounds; and Mary Baynham told Mrs. Crowther about a church bazaar, which had electrified Truro, and at which she had “helped” at somebody else’s stall. “It was hard work standing about and trying to sell things all day, and persuading stingy old gentlemen to put into raffles for talking dolls,” said Miss Baynham. “I have pitied shop-girls ever since.” Mrs. Baynham gave the signal for departure, feeling that her dinner, from a material point of view, had been a success. The lobster sauce had been backward, and the three last people to whom the _vol au vent_ was offered had got very little except pie-crust and white sauce, but those were small blemishes. The mutton and the pheasants had been unimpeachable; and on those substantial elements Mrs. Baynham took her stand. She had spared neither pains nor money. Her Italian cream was cream, and not cornflour. Her cabinet-pudding was a work of art. She felt satisfied with herself, and knew that the doctor would approve; and yet she felt somehow that the moral atmosphere had not been altogether free from storm-cloud. Colonel Disney had looked on at the feast with a gloomy countenance; Mr. Crowther had talked in an unpleasant tone. “I am afraid those two will never forget the church path,” she thought, as she set her nieces down to Zampa, and then went to inspect the card-table in a snug corner near the fire, with its freshly lighted wax candles, and new cards placed ready for the good old English game which our ancestors called whist. Zampa once started meant a noisy evening. Captain Pentreath would sing “The Maid of Llangollen,” and “Drink, puppy, drink.” Mary Baynham would murder “It was a dream,” and scream the higher notes in “Ruby.” Duet would follow solo, and fantasia succeed ballad, Mrs. Baynham’s idea of a social gathering being the nearest attainable approach to a penny reading. She would have had recitations, and imitations of popular actors, had there been any one capable of providing that form of amusement. This evening, however, she failed in getting a quartette for whist. Neither Mr. Crowther nor his wife was disposed for cards; Colonel Disney coldly declined; and it was useless to ask the young people to leave the attractions of that woody piano. While she was lamenting this state of things, the whist-table being usually a feature in her drawing-room, the Disneys and Allegra bade her good night, and were gone before she had time to remonstrate with them for so early a departure.