Being seated at dinner the next day off the cold leg of mutton that Smithers had admired so the day before, and Gus as usual having his legs under our mahogany, a hackney-coach drove up to the door, which we did not much heed; a step was heard on the floor, which we hoped might be for the two-pair lodger, when who should burst into the room but Mrs. Hoggarty herself!  Gus, who was blowing the froth off a pot of porter preparatory to a delicious drink of the beverage, and had been making us die of laughing with his stories and jokes, laid down the pewter pot as Mrs. H. came in, and looked quite sick and pale.  Indeed we all felt a little uneasy.

My aunt looked haughtily in Mary’s face, then fiercely at Gus, and saying, “It is too true—­my poor boy—­already!” flung herself hysterically into my arms, and swore, almost choking, that she would never never leave me.

I could not understand the meaning of this extraordinary agitation on Mrs. Hoggarty’s part, nor could any of us.  She refused Mary’s hand when the poor thing rather nervously offered it; and when Gus timidly said, “I think, Sam, I’m rather in the way here, and perhaps—­had better go,” Mrs. H. looked him full in the face, pointed to the door majestically with her forefinger, and said, “I think, sir, you had better go.”

“I hope Mr. Hoskins will stay as long as he pleases,” said my wife, with spirit.

“Of course you hope so, madam,” answered Mrs. Hoggarty, very sarcastic.  But Mary’s speech and my aunt’s were quite lost upon Gus; for he had instantly run to his hat, and I heard him tumbling downstairs.

The quarrel ended, as usual, by Mary’s bursting into a fit of tears, and by my aunt’s repeating the assertion that it was not too late, she trusted; and from that day forth she would never never leave me.

“What could have made Aunt return and be so angry?” said I to Mary that night, as we were in our own room; but my wife protested she did not know:  and it was only some time after that I found out the reason of this quarrel, and of Mrs. H.’s sudden reappearance.

The horrible fat coarse little Smithers told me the matter as a very good joke, only the other year, when he showed me the letter of Hickson, Dixon, Paxton and Jackson, which has before been quoted in my Memoirs.

“Sam my boy,” said he, “you were determined to leave Mrs. Hoggarty in Brough’s clutches at the Rookery, and I was determined to have her away.  I resolved to kill two of your mortal enemies with one stone as it were.  It was quite clear to me that the Reverend Grimes Wapshot had an eye to your aunt’s fortune; and that Mr. Brough had similar predatory intentions regarding her.  Predatory is a mild word, Sam:  if I had said robbery at once, I should express my meaning clearer.

“Well, I took the Fulham stage, and arriving, made straight for the lodgings of the reverend gentleman.  ‘Sir,’ said I, on finding that worthy gent,—­he was drinking warm brandy-and-water, Sam, at two o’clock in the day, or at least the room smelt very strongly of that beverage—­’Sir,’ says I, ’you were tried for forgery in the year ’14, at Lancaster assizes.’