Mrs. Buzza reflected.

“I will!” she exclaimed at last.  Just then her husband’s voice detonated in the room above.  She arose, trembling like a leaf.  “Be firm,” said her adviser.

“I will.”

“Sit down again.  It will do him no harm to wait.”

Mrs. Buzza obeyed, still trembling.

It was at this moment that the Honourable Frederic re-entered the room, and looked around with a slow smile.

“Nellie,” he observed, when they were outside the house, “you’re a vastly clever woman, my love.”

“How’s the Admiral?” was the reply.

“He nibbles, my angel; he bites.”

“I heard him barkin’.  An’ how long will Brady be givin’ us?”

“Two months, my treasure.”

Mrs. Goodwyn-Sandys reflected for a moment, and then made the following extraordinary reply—­

“Be aisy, me dear.  In six weeks I’ll be ready to elope from yez.”

What passed between the Admiral and Mrs. Buzza when they were left together was never fully known.  But it was quickly whispered that in No. 2, Alma Villas, the worm had turned.  Oddly enough, the spread of conjugal estrangement did not end here.  It began to be rumoured that Lawyer Pellow and his wife had “differences “; that Mr. and Mrs. Simpson dined at different hours; and that the elder Miss Strip had broken off a very suitable match with a young ship’s chandler, on the ground that ship’s candles were not “genteel.”  It was about this time, too, that Mrs. Wapshot, at the confectionery shop, refused to walk with Mr. Wapshot on the Rope-walk after Sunday evening service, because domestic bliss was “horrid vulgar”; and Mrs. Goodwyn-Sandys’ dictum that “one admirer, at least, was no more than a married woman’s due,” only failed of acceptance because the supply of admirers in Troy fell short of the demand.  She had herself annexed Samuel Buzza and Mr. Moggridge.

Meanwhile the Admiral was not idle; and had anything been needed to whet his desire for a Club, it would have been found in a dreadful event that happened shortly afterwards.

It was May-morning, and the Admiral was planted in the sunshine outside No. 2, Alma Villas, loudly discussing the question of the hour with Mr. Goodwyn-Sandys, Lawyer Pellow, and the little Doctor.

“No, we can’t have him,” he was roundly declaring; “the Club must be select, or it is useless to discuss it further.”

“Must draw the line somewhere,” murmured the Honourable Frederic.

“Quite so; at this rate we shall be admitting all the ’Jolly Trojans.’”

Just then an enormous wheelbarrow was observed approaching, seemingly by supernatural means, for no driver could be seen.  The barrow was piled to a great height, and staggered drunkenly from side to side of the road; but the load, whatever it was, lay hidden beneath a large white cloth.

“H’m!” said the little Doctor dubiously.  “Well, of course, you know best, but I should have thought that as an old inhabitant of Troy—­”