The next day, as my brother was returning from his hospital, at which he had had an extra and emergent case, he saw B.'s palkee at G.'s door, and though he was anxious to get home to his dinner (he always dined at 3 p.m.), curiosity prompted him to look in at G.'s for a few minutes. G. said, as he shook hands with him: 'You've come just in time to hear B.'s report of his visit to Mrs. H.' 'To Mrs. H.? Surely he has not had the audacity to go there! I should have thought that after the little performances of last night that was the last place he would have ventured near.' 'So did I,' replied G., 'and though he said last night before he left that he thought he should call on Mrs. H. this morning, I didn't believe he meant to do it.' 'But he has done it,' said H. B., 'and if you like I'll tell you what passed between us.' 'Of course we should like to hear the report beyond everything.' 'Well,' said B., his eyes dancing with the sense of fun, 'as soon as I stepped out of the palkee the maty came running to say Mrs. not very well; couldn't see me. I expected this, and was prepared for it. I had written on one of my cards in pencil "Very particular." I gave it to him, and told him to give it to his mistress, and that I would wait for the answer. By-and-by he came to say that if I would step into the drawing-room and sit down for a few minutes Mrs. H. would see me. So I sat down, and in about ten minutes the fair lady made her appearance, and without saying good-morning, or shaking hands with me, or any of the usual proprieties, she said at once: "Very pretty doings at Mr. Goodwin's last night--doings that I don't think at all respectable--keeping my husband out half the night." "Oh, not so bad as that, Harriet" (we are cousins, you know), interrupted I. "As to the exact time I can't say," said Mrs. H., "but I know he was much later than he ought to have been, and much later than he promised me he would be, and I don't thank you for helping to detain him--in fact, from his account you were quite as bad as Mr. G. himself." "If you knew all," said I, "you wouldn't say that." "If I knew all," said Mrs. H. "What do you mean"--opening her eyes wide--"if I knew all? Pray explain yourself." "It is for that reason that I am here," said I. "Well, what is it?" said the lady, becoming impatient. "But I know"--making her eyes small again--"you have nothing to tell me; you only want to excuse and smooth down that very pretty, gentleman-like trick of deceiving my husband as to the hour. I wonder you were not all of you ashamed to combine together to tell a falsehood in order to deceive a poor----" Here she stopped. "Weak silly fellow" I thought was coming, but she recollected herself in time and stopped, and then said: "But I'll take care how he goes to Mr. G.'s again, that you may rely on. And pray, sir" (I saw she was getting warm), "what may this explanation or excuse be that you say on your card is so _very particular_?" "Why, really, Mrs.