In the stern condemnation of moral delinquencies, when such are discovered or conjectured, we may be content to find nothing but what is praiseworthy; the simultaneous exhibition of a hungry curiosity about them is one of those features of human nature which it is best to accept without comment--if only for the reason that no man can be sure that he does not in some degree share it. In Catsford at this time it was decidedly prominent. The place went wild on the news that Sir John Aspenick, happening to be in Paris on a flying visit, thought that he saw Jenny go by as he stood outside the Cafe de la Paix: great was the disappointment that Sir John could not contrive even to think that he had seen Octon with her! Lady Sarah Lacey, working on the feminine clew of Jenny's having departed luggageless, set inquiries afoot among London dressmakers, with the happy result of revealing the fact that Jenny had bought a stock of several articles of wearing apparel: the news worked back to Chat from one of the dressmakers, and from Chat I had it, with more details of the wearing apparel that my memory carries. Mrs. Jepps waylaid Chat--who had timidly ventured into the town under a pressing need of finding some very special form of needle--in the main street and tried the comparative method, not at all a bad mode of investigation where manners forbid direct questions. She told Chat numbers of stories of other "sad cases" and looked to see how Chat "took" them--hoping to draw, augur-like, conclusions from Chat's expression. I myself--well, I would not be uncharitable. My friends were all honorable men; they might naturally conclude that I was depressed and lonely; why look farther for the cause of the frequent visits from them which I enjoyed? Bindlecombe and a dozen more so honored me, and Cartmell told me that only the severest office discipline kept his working hours sacred from kind intruders.