So she hadn’t perceived who my companion at the step had been! Well, she should be enlightened, they all should be enlightened, and vengeance was mine. I spoke with gentleness:-- “Your nephew’s impressions, I fear, are still confused by his deplorable misadventure.” “May I ask what you know about his impressions?” Out of the corner of my eye I saw the hand of Mrs. Trevise move toward her bell; but she wished to hear all about it more than she wished concord at her harmonious table; and the hand stopped. Juno spoke again. “Who, pray, has later news than what I bring?” My enemy was in my hand; and an enemy in the hand is worth I don’t know how many in the bush. I answered most gently: “I do not come from Mr. Mayrant’s bedside, because I have just left him at the front door in sound health--saving a bruise over his left eye.” During a second we all sat in a high-strung silence, and then Juno became truly superb. “Who sees the scars he brazenly conceals?” It took away my breath; my battle would have been lost, when the Briton suggested: “But mayn’t he have shown those to his Aunt?” We sat in no silence now; the first et cetera made extraordinary sounds on his plate, Mrs. Trevise tinkled her handbell with more unction than I had ever yet seen in her; and while she and Daphne interchanged streams of severe words which I was too disconcerted to follow, the other et ceteras and the honeymooners hectically effervesced into small talk. I presently found myself eating our last course amid a reestablished calm, when, with a rustle, Juno swept out from among us, to return (I suppose) to the bedside. As she passed behind the Briton’s chair, that invaluable person kicked me under the table, and on my raising my eyes to him he gave me a large, robust wink. X: High Walk and the Ladies