“Oh, lots of things. But then you know the grand maxim in society is that you _mustn’t_ speak your mind. It’s like that Latin person’s rule of nil thingamy; you mustn’t admire any thing, you know; and so on. And one must unlearn all one’s Catechism, about loving one’s neighbour as oneself, and doing unto others as one would they should--which always reminds me of a winter Sunday afternoon at school and broken chilblains, because one _did_ break once while I was saying it. And you see in society the thing is to let your neighbour go his way and to go yours, and to say, ‘Bless my soul! exactly as I anticipated; paw creatchaw!’ if your neighbour tumbles over a precipice, from which it would be the very worst of bad manners to hold him back; and in society, if you saw the good Samaritan--no, the other person--lying wounded in the road, it would be a dreadful _incon_--what it’s name?--to pick him up and take him to an inn and pay for his lodging, because he might call you to account for your impertinent officiousness as soon as he got well. So, though I have been bursting to speak my mind almost ever since I’ve known you, Mr. Tredethlyn, I’ve held my tongue until to-night. But to-night the climax has come, and I _must_ speak. Oh, you poor dear thing!” cried Rosa, in a sudden outburst of sympathy, “how you and your wife have been talked about!” “Talked about!--by whom, when, and where?” “By everybody, always, everywhere. You don’t know--though you ought to know, if you ever listened to what was going on around you--how people _do_ talk. They’ve talked about your dissipation, the hours you have kept, the places you have been seen at, the people you have been seen with; about your coming home in hansom cabs in the middle of the night; and I think if quieter vehicles could be invented for people who stay out late, or at least the doors made to open differently, there wouldn’t _be_ so much scandal. They’ve talked about your getting _tipsy_,” exclaimed Rosa, shaking her head solemnly, and laying a tremendous stress upon the obnoxious word; “and they’ve said you were drinking yourself into an early grave, and that Harcourt Lowther was leading you on to your death in order that he might marry your wife afterwards.” “Harcourt lead me--to my death--and--marry Maude! Oh, no, no, no; it is too horrible!” gasped Francis, staring at Miss Grunderson, with his head clasped in his hands, and big beads of perspiration upon his brow. “I know it is,” answered Rosa; “but they say it; and you must own it was not a wise thing for you to be so very intimate with a man who was engaged to your wife before you married her.” “Engaged to my wife! _Who_ was engaged to my wife?” “Why, Harcourt Lowther, of course! Didn’t you know all about it?” “No, so help me Heaven!” Miss Grunderson looked very grave. All that she had said had been spoken in perfect good faith; but, all at once, she began to see that mischief might come of this free utterance of her thoughts.