MRS. G. I bully _you?_ How could I! You're so strong. (_Hysterically._) Strong enough to pick me up and put me outside the door and leave me there to cry. Aren't you? CAPT. G. It seems to me that you're an irrational little baby. Are you quite well? MRS. G. Do I look ill? (_Returning to table._) Who is your lady friend with the big gray envelope and the fat monogram outside? CAPT. G. (_Aside._) Then it wasn't locked up, confound it. (_Aloud._) 'God made her, therefore let her pass for a woman.' You remember what farcy-buds are like? MRS. G. (_Showing envelope._) This has nothing to do with _them._ I'm going to open it. May I? CAPT. G. Certainly, if you want to. I'd sooner you didn't, though. I don't ask to look at your letters to the Deercourt girl. MRS. G. You'd _better_ not, Sir! (_Takes letter from envelope._) Now, may I look? If you say no, I shall cry. CAPT. G. You've never cried in my knowledge of you, and I don't believe you could. MRS. G. I feel very like it to-day, Pip. Don't be hard on me. (_Reads letter._) It begins in the middle, without any 'Dear Captain Gadsby,' or anything. How funny! CAPT. G. (_Aside._) No, it's not Dear Captain Gadsby, or anything, now. How funny! MRS. G. What a strange letter! (_Reads._) 'And so the moth has come too near the candle at last, and has been singed into--shall I say Respectability? I congratulate him, and hope he will be as happy as he deserves to be.' What does that mean? Is she congratulating you about our marriage? CAPT. G. Yes, I suppose so. MRS. G. (_Still reading letter._) She seems to be a particular friend of yours. CAPT. G. Yes. She was an excellent matron of sorts--a Mrs. Herriott--wife of a Colonel Herriott. I used to know some of her people at Home long ago--before I came out. MRS. G. Some Colonels' wives are young--as young as me. I knew one who was younger. CAPT. G. Then it couldn't have been Mrs. Herriott. She was old enough to have been your mother, dear. MRS. G. I remember now. Mrs. Scargill was talking about her at the Duffins' tennis, before you came for me, on Tuesday. Captain Mafflin said she was a 'dear old woman.' Do you know, I think Mafflin is a very clumsy man with his feet. CAPT. G. (_Aside._) Good old Jack! (_Aloud._) Why, dear? MRS. G. He had put his cup down on the ground then, and he literally stepped into it. Some of the tea spirted over my dress--the gray one. I meant to tell you about it before. CAPT. G. (_Aside._) There are the makings of a strategist about Jack, though his methods are coarse. (_Aloud._) You'd better get a new dress, then. (_Aside._) Let us pray that that will turn her. MRS. G. Oh, it isn't stained in the least. I only thought that I'd tell you. (_Returning to letter._) _What_ an extraordinary person! (_Reads._) 'But need I remind you that you have taken upon yourself a charge of wardship'--what in the world is a charge of wardship?--'which, as you yourself know, may end in Consequences--'