The controversy, of which the foregoing is a condensation, had passed the quarrelsome point when the disputants arrived in the drawing-room, shutting out the melodious trill of the chit, the squeaks of the little beggar, and the lieutenant's bass voice, saying, "He and the kitten were having a high old time with my boots early this morning." The argument was in the mutual-amends stage, and Mr. Brownrigg was enlarging on the enthralling and irresistible fascination of Hopkins's style, while Mr. Wraxall was equally eloquent on the almost Nicholsonian vigour and expansiveness of Smith's. They were then separated, and presently the insurer was audible afar, enlarging to Lady Arkroyd on a scheme for insuring against damage at the Wash, in which she was much interested; while the Grauboschite was mentioning some further details of that great man's system to Mrs. Ramsey Tomes. Who, however, only said: "I think my husband would like to hear that," or "Have you mentioned that to Mr. Tomes?" but gave no sign of receiving, or of ever having in her life received, an idea on her own account. The Baronet and the M.P. simply went on, like the water coming in when the ball-cock has stuck, and nobody will be at work till Monday. All this is only to impress on the story the quiet of that sofa-haven, and to justify Judith for feeling practically out of reach of interruption if she should be inclined to carry on the skein-twisting a little prematurely--that is, without waiting for a visiting acquaintance with the probably plebeian wife, to put her friendship with the husband on an ascertained footing. Now Judith was not without a well-defined motive for the skein-twisting, as was hinted at the end of our last chapter. We rather think that if she had not been she would have suspected something abnormal in Challis's matrimonies from his manner when he said "Craik." Women are as sharp as all that--oh dear, yes! After a little discursive chat to make sure that no floating interruption would desert the other group-units and bear down on their haven, Judith was seized with a sudden intense apprehension that Mr. Challis could write a tragedy. She can have had very slight grounds for this conclusion; she had almost no knowledge of that author's work, as we have seen. But she relied on his vanity to make him take an easy-going view of any claims she had to pronounce him Shakespeare. Pleasing verdicts soothe the cavils of incredulous modesty, and suggest unsuspected data in the bush. But he was bound to make some sort of protest. It would never do to say he rather thought he could. "What makes you think that?" he said.