Patty went to the opera that night, as she had intended, her heart almost bursting; for that she should have hoped to meet somebody who would introduce and help her, and then to find that somebody was Margaret Osborne, was almost more than she could bear; but soon she was soothed by perceiving that more opera-glasses were fixed on her than ever, and that the people in the boxes opposite, and in the stalls, were pointing her out to one another. She caught the sound of her own name as she sat well forward in her box, that her diamonds might be well seen and her own charms appreciated; and she almost forgot the indignity to which she had been, as she thought, subjected. But as she went out, poor Patty could not but hear some remarks which were not intended for her ear. “That was the woman,” somebody said, “the heroine of the great case, Piercey _versus_ Piercey; don’t you remember? the woman who married an idiot, and then got his father to leave her all the property.” “What a horror!” said the lady addressed: “a barmaid, wasn’t she? and the poor creature she married quite imbecile--and now to come and plant herself there in the front of a box. Does she think anybody will take any notice of her, I wonder?” “Impudent little face, but rather broken down--begins to see it won’t pay,” said another man. Patty caught Robert, her footman, by the arm, and shrieked to him to take her out of this, or she should faint, which the crowd around took for an exclamation of real despair, and made way for the lady, to let her get to the air. And Patty left town next day. CHAPTER XLVII.