Twice he bethought him of telling Deborah all about it; but she looked so comfortable and composed, as she sat there darning his socks, that he thought it would be a pity to disturb and agitate her. So his dreams, when he retired to rest, were very wild indeed, and he passed altogether a sleepless night.--So much for the doctor's love-making. Volume 1, Chapter XI. DES BEAUX YEUX. No words can paint the mingled rage and mortification that filled the heart of Lady Inskip as she drove away from The Poplars, after her interview with the dowager. "The Jezabel!" she said, in a voice of anger, "I've never been so scandalously treated in my life. You need not laugh, miss!" she fired out on Carry, who was exploding in fits of laughter at the humorous nature of the rencontre. "You need not laugh, miss; it is no laughing matter to see your mother insulted! But what can you expect from a vulgar boor but abuse? I ought to have known that before I laid myself open to such treatment. I don't think I can ask that young Hartshorne to my house again after this." "Good gracious! ma," said Carry; "why what has he got to do with it? I'm sure he's a very nice fellow, and he is not accountable for his mother's actions." "Well," said the old campaigner, mollifying somewhat, as she got further from the scene of her defeat, and allowed her better judgment to prevail; "perhaps he's not to blame, and I am sure I never said so. He can come of course to the pic-nic, now he is invited; but I am sorry I left the note with that old cat, after all. Never mind, it's done now, and there's no use in regretting it. He is a good match; and if you listen to my words, Carry," she leaned over and said confidentially to her daughter, so that Buttons might not overhear, "instead of giggling so foolishly, and play you cards well, you will secure him in spite of that Jezabel, his mother. Not that I am afraid of her, or twenty like her," Lady Inskip said to herself consolingly, now that a distance of road lay between them. But where was Master Tom all this while? Well, you must understand that Mr Thomas Hartshorne, of Her Majesty's Plungers, was, and had been all the morning, learning the craft of fly-fishing on the banks of the little stream that ran by the bottom of the parsonage, under the apt tuition of the incumbent's sister. The young reverend himself had long since gone out for his parochial duties, such as enquiring after farmer Giles' rheumatism, and the widow Blake's asthma, intending also to do himself the honour of calling on Lady Inskip on his way home, for Pringle had been much struck by the charming Laura the more he saw of her, and wanted to see more still. It was most surprising what a violent and indefatigable interest that previously indolent young man Tom had taken in the piscatorial art.