“And I make no doubt you see nothing reprehensible in his addiction to the gaming-table! But I had it on the most excellent authority that he dropped three thousand pounds at one sitting at Almack’s!”
Lady Wyndham moaned, and dabbed at her eyes. “Oh, do not say so!”
“Yes, but he’s so devilish wealthy it can’t signify!” said George.
“Marriage,” said Louisa, “will put a stop to such fripperies.”
The depressing picture this dictum conjured up reduced George to silence. Lady Wyndham said, in a voice dark with mystery: “Only a mother could appreciate my anxieties. He is at a dangerous age, and I live from day to day in dread of what he may do!”
George opened his mouth, encountered a look from his wife, shut it again, and tugged unhappily at his cravat.
The door opened; a Corinthian stood upon the threshold, cynically observing his relatives. “A thousand apologies,” said the Corinthian, bored but polite. “Your very obedient servant, ma’am. Louisa, yours! My poor George! Ah—was I expecting you?”
“Apparently not!” retorted Louisa, bristling.
“No, you weren’t. I mean, they took it into their heads— I couldn’t stop them!” said George heroically.
“I thought I was not,” said the Corinthian, closing the door, and advancing into the room. “But my memory, you know, my lamentable memory!”