Mrs. R. Haslam. Sense of duty.
Mr. R. Haslam. No doubt you are right. I seemed to gather that it was Flora's beauty that had roused his conscience.
Mrs. R. Haslam. Oh, no!
Flora. That had what?
Charles. (Coming towards the group, unable to control his impatience.) Oh, hang it! The curate was a sham curate—not a curate at all.
Cedric. (Taking it in.) A sham curate!
Flora. But surely such things don't happen?
Mrs. R. Haslam. That's what many people said when I made a shopwalker successfully personate an archdeacon in "The Woman of Kent." Everyone said so until Mr. Gladstone wrote that he found the episode quite convincing. You remember, dear?
Mr. R. Haslam. Vividly.
Mrs. R. Haslam. I assure you it happens quite frequently that from one cause or another people who think they are married are not married. Why, sometimes special Acts of Parliament have to be passed in order to set things right—when they've gone altogether too far. I well recall that when I studied this subject, as of course I did, coming across a case in which, owing to a church having been consecrated very carelessly, a lady who supposed herself to be the legitimate mother of sixteen children—poor thing——