Her eyes intent upon Sir Percy, who now kept to the fore with his host, My Lady Peggy, on the keen lookout for the possible assassin, and to the tune of “consents,” and its running-mate, “I would to God it had been in open church!” put in a very dolorous twenty miles; but, on dismounting at Mr. Brummell’s doorstep, she endeavored to infuse a little joyousness into her looks and speech. Indeed, ’twas difficult; yet no more so to-day than any other since she had been coerced by circumstances into an acceptance of the Beau’s hospitality. Every mouthful of bread and meat Peggy ate well-nigh choked her, as she remembered ’twas meant for Sir Robin McTart. She felt herself a trickster, a villain of the deepest dye, and yet saw no way out of her usurped character with honor and repute; no way of keeping in it save by the deeper dyeing of her soul in sin, which she promised herself, and heaven, to expiate as soon as Percy should be safe from Sir Robin’s men. The afternoon was spent as had been planned; the country cook’s dinner was voted a perfect success: Mr. Chalmers, slightly raised by wine, even going so far as to send her down, with his compliments, his favorite ruby heart-pin: when, on the spot, not a gentleman present but whipped out a jewel from ruffle, finger, pocket or fob, and Peggy herself tying ’em up in a pocket-napkin laced with Brussels and perfumed like the civet-cat, sent them down to the astonished lass in the kitchen. A game of cards was in order after the repast: a tilt at politics: a wager on the question of tea in the Colonies; Lady Peggy and Sir Percy keeping, by the grace of each, well apart in all these encounters; and at twelve o’clock, just as the moon was rising behind a bank of splendid star-fringed clouds, Mr. Brummell and his guests set forth on their homeward road. The beauty of the night was such as soothes and casts its own mantle of peace over even those unquiet spirits which may be abroad. It reminded Lady Peggy, as she rode along, of just such another when she and Percy had wandered up and down together in the weedy gardens at Kennaston. Of that identical night Percy also was thinking, and of his wilful Lady’s bright sallies, quick smiles, frowns; yea, even of one little touch of her red lips, light as thistledown, which now he seemed to feel the ghost of, on his forehead. The cavalcade had left the highway some distance behind; the moon was fast being overtaken by the clouds whence she had, an hour or more ago, emerged; the dews fell thick, and the scent of the hawthorn was sweet in the air as they plunged into Epstowe Forest. “Ah, Gentlemen,” cried out Mr. Brummell, snapping his whip, “by Gad, Sirs, what a night for Tom Kidde and his merry men! the skies dark, the moon playin’ hide and seek, fifteen watches and purses, and as many rings, pins and seals between us as you left not at Ivy Dene with my cook Elizabeth!”