"An old woman!" exclaimed the minister, whom an unlucky twinge made at that moment doubly impatient, "old women are the plague of my life! So I am to send Mrs. Churchill down to the very spot where a treasonable correspondence is most easily managed; and by the ease with which she gets out of a first scrape, give her all possible encouragement to get into another. Well, I was quite right in asking what preposterous request had you come here about!"
"I see," returned Lady Marchmont, "that old women are no favourites of yours; but if you would extend your clemency to Mrs. Churchill, I think she has seen her folly, and will leave conspiracies to themselves in future."
"And who," asked Sir Robert, "will become sureties for her future good conduct?"
This appeared an easy question to answer; and from the early friends of their house, Ethel selected two neighbouring gentlemen, to whom she had always been accustomed to look with the utmost respect. She could scarcely have made a worse selection, for they were two most
