My lord's first footman, a stout high-coloured personage in charge of the blunderbuss, was unremitting in his attentions, and Mistress Rachel, as she was called, in the absence of higher game, condescended to receive his homage with the favour five-and-forty shows to five-and-twenty. At a subsequent period indeed she declared "he hadn't the heart of a hen!" but for the present seemed satisfied to accept him as he was. Such a favourable state of things could not be expected to last four-and-twenty hours. At noon of the second day it began to rain, a trace broke, a horse cast a shoe, the man with the blunderbuss proved useless in a difficulty, Mistress Rachel grew despondent, my lady sulked, my lord swore, the unwieldy vehicle creaked, groaned, swung, and finally stopped in the middle of a hill. "Let me out!" screamed Lady Bellinger, whose nervous system was of the weakest, and on whose temper fear had an exasperating effect. "I'd rather walk. I _will_ get out, I'll go back,--Richard!--Robin! open the door." "Don't be a fool!" exclaimed my lord, as the carriage got into motion once more. "How can you go back, Ellen? You're forty miles from London if you're a yard." My lady's head-dress vibrated with anger. "I am a fool indeed," she replied, "or I shouldn't be here! And this is the reward of my devotion as a wife. This is your return for my accompanying you into exile. Lord Bellinger, I _will_ speak. Indifference I am accustomed to. Unkindness I have put up with for many a long day, patient, and forbearing, while my heart was broke, but I have a spirit ("you have indeed," muttered his lordship), though you try your best to crush it, and ill-usage I will submit to no longer." It is possible her husband might have entered a more energetic protest than the "d--d nonsense" he whispered under his breath, but that his attention was diverted at this juncture to the beauty and action of a horse passing at a gallop, ridden by a young man whose seat and bearing did justice to the animal he bestrode. When Lord Bellinger, who thrust himself half out of the carriage to follow the pair with his eyes, subsided into his seat, he had forgotten all about their dispute in this new excitement; my lady, however, with her face buried in a handkerchief, continued to sob at intervals, till they reached their destination for the night.