But Mr. Fenton drank to excess and there was an ugly scandal one night when he drove a bottle at a guest he had insulted and the watch was called in, and it got about and men fought shy of the resort and betook themselves to pastures new. ’Twas a very inferior set of persons came there now, and had Mrs. Beswick enquired into the circumstances as narrowly as became her prudence she had never become Mrs. Fenton. A good easy woman, it perhaps weighed with her that Mr. Fenton was so cordial in welcoming her daughter and she stayed not to consider his motive. “’Tis Di for a good song,” says he, sitting with his arm about her and his glass and churchwarden at his elbow, “and a pretty face into the bargain, and if custom is lacking here, which is certainly not the case, her face at the windows would do the trick in a jiffy. Bring her then, Lavinia, to a kindly welcome and a cut at my mutton for so long as the rakehelly gallants leave her with us—which I dare swear won’t be long.” This speech might have gave Mrs. Beswick pause but did not. Perhaps she saw the matter plainer when she became Mrs. Fenton, for it is certain she then was a very dragon of propriety and therefore though certain men, by courtesy called gay and gallant, still frequented the house, ’twas much if they caught a glimpse of Diana vanishing up the stair with a Parthian dart of a lovely ankle beneath her hoop, or heard a voice carolling above like a lark in the clouds. Indeed ’twas more reasonable to hope for a word with Her Royal Highness at St. James’s! And so it stood, in spite of Mr. Fenton who saw his hope of a lure melting from him. Mrs. Fenton’s tail was pinning up for a visit to a neighbour when Diana entered the parlour, and, seeing her mother preparing to go out, drew back at the door. It fell unlucky for ’twas now or never, and even her young courage was somewhat daunted at her own action, and the disclosing of it. But she was desperate. Suppose Mr. Fenton should come in! Suppose her mother should hear some rumour—for it seemed such news must be striding the city already on every tongue! So with a hundred supposes trembling in her heart, she ventured to accost the lady so busily occupied with festooning her ample skirts over her hoop. “Will my mamma be so obliging as delay going out until I venture a word with her?” “Why, Di, how can I? ’Tis most unreasonable when well you know I’m bespoke to Mrs. Clayton for a week. Come hither and help me.” The beauty knelt on one knee and took the corking pins obedient. Then paused, and looked up pleading. “If my mamma did but know the good fortune that hath befallen me, I should not ask in vain.”