One old enough to be your chaperon, and young enough
to be your companion. She has some other merits too, not the least of
which, in my estimation is that she professes to be a great friend of
mine."
"A crowning virtue, that," said lady Mabel.
"It does not blind me, however, to two or three faults, and a
misfortune she labors under."
"What then are her faults?"
"The first is, that she is, it must be confessed, rather simple."
"Simplicity may be a virtue. We will overlook that."
"Then she sometimes clips the king's English!"
"There is no statute against it, like clipping his coin."
"She is afflicted, moreover, with an inveterate love of sight-seeing."
"That is a positive virtue. I have fellow-feeling with her. She would
be no true woman if she ever lost her chance at a spectacle. But what
is her misfortune?"
"She is the wife of a commissary," said L'Isle with a very grave face.
"Why L'Isle," said Lord Strathern, "has Shortridge brought his wife to
Elvas?"
"Yes, my lord, they came last night. Yes, Lady Mabel; the woman who
marries a commissary can hardly escape being the wife of a knave!"
"But I really believe," said his lordship, "that our rascal is the
most honest fellow in the commissariat department.
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