Was the Miriam who chafed at her disappointment, and invented casuistical arguments to excuse herself, the same Miriam who walked over to see Mortimer, Wake, and Collins on behalf of Mr. Cutts? Precisely the same.
The doctor kept his engagement, and in an hour returned with a nurse.
When Miriam saw she was relieved, she became compassionate.
"I am so grieved," she said to the doctor, "to see Miss Tippit so ill.
Is there really nothing I can do for her?"
"Nothing, madam."
Miriam, so grieved, rushed downstairs wild with excitement and delight, laid hold of Andrew, half asleep, twitched him merrily out of the chair, and they were off. In a few minutes they were at the hall, and found that they were in ample time to hear Mr. Montgomery's first song.
He had taken particular care not to include anything offensive or even broad, so that one of his audience who eat below Miriam and Andrew exclaimed in their hearing that it was "a d——d pious night," and wondered "what Mont's little game was."
One of Mr. Montgomery's most telling serious songs was sung in the costume of a sailor. There was a description of his wanderings over the "salt, salt sea," which rhymed with something "free," as it always does, and there was a slightly veiled account of his exploits amongst the damsels of different countries, always harmless, so at least ran the version for the night, and yet he swore when he returned that
"My lovely Poll at Portsmouth,
When in my arms I caught her,
Was worth a hundred foreign gals
On the t'other side the water"—
a sentiment which was tumultuously applauded, although few of the men present had travelled, and those who were married were probably not so rapturously in love with their own domestic Polls.
Andrew was not quite comfortable, but Miriam applauded with the rest.