"Aye, aye. Well, to-morrow I shall bring you some of the songs you'll have to sing in my 'Beggar's Opera'--that is if we can talk that curmudgeon Rich into the ideas that I and my friends have in our minds. Are you lodging in Hampstead?" "Oh, yes. I'm staying with Hannah's cousin. You remember Hannah, don't you, Mr. Gay? I told you what a good friend she was to me and how she saved me from my wicked mother and the designing fellow I was so silly as to run away with. I shall never forget my mad fancies--never!" "Best forget them, my dear, though I fear you'll be apt to drive out one fit of madness by taking on another. 'Tis the way love has, and----" "Oh," interrupted Lavinia hastily, "I don't believe it. I'm not going to bother about love any more." "Every woman has uttered those words, and has had to eat them. How many times have you eaten yours, my pretty Polly, since last you resolved to forswear love?" "Not once. I've learned my lesson. I know it now by heart." "So it doesn't interest you now to know anything about poor Lance Vane?" It was not the pale moonlight that made Lavinia's cheeks at that moment look so white. Gay, who was gazing fixedly at her, saw her lips quiver. "Poor Lance Vane? Why do you speak of him like that? Has he had his play accepted and has it made his fortune?" she exclaimed ironically. "Neither the one nor the other. Ill luck's dogged him. I fear he wasn't born under a prosperous star." "I'm sorry if he's been unfortunate. Perhaps though it was his own fault." A note of sadness had crept into her voice as Gay did not fail to note. "Well, it's hard to say. To be sure, his tragedy would not have taken the town--neither Rich nor Cibber would have aught to do with it, but he had worse misfortunes than that. He was denounced as a traitorous Jacobite and thrown into Newgate." "That horrible place! Oh, I can't believe it," cried Lavinia, clasping her hands. "Mr. Vane was no traitor, I'm sure--although----" She paused. Politically Lancelot Vane might be incapable of treason, but where love was concerned--well, had he not acted traitorously towards her? "That's true. Vane was no traitor. He was accused out of spite. I went to see him in Newgate. They had thrust him in the 'lion's den,' the most filthy and abominable of infernos, and he was loaded with fetters. That was because he hadn't a penny to 'garnish' his sharks of gaolers. You know what 'garnish' means, child?" "Yes, indeed--money to bribe the gaolers with." "Aye, from the Governor downward, and not forgetting the chaplain. I was able by flinging about a few guineas to better his condition, and as the gaol fever was creeping upon the poor fellow, they were glad enough to get rid of him. While I was there, he told me the whole story. It began like most other stories with a woman." "Oh, I know," burst out Lavinia, "you needn't tell me. The woman was that worthless creature, Sally Salisbury."