would not see the devil at work upon them; and it required his dear suffering saint to be at death’s doors, cut to pieces and gasping, to open his eyes.  But, thank heaven, they were opened at last!  Now he saw the beast he was:  a filthy beast! unworthy of tying his wife’s shoestring.  No confessions could expose to them the beast he was.  But let them not fancy there was no such thing as an active devil about the world.

Redworth divined that the simply sensational man abased himself before Providence and heaped his gratitude on the awful Power in order to render it difficult for the promise of the safety of his wife to be withdrawn.

He said:  ‘There is good hope’; and drew an admonition upon himself.

‘Ah! my dear good Redworth,’ Sir Lukin sighed from his elevation of outspoken penitence:  ’you will see as I do some day.  It is the devil, think as you like of it.  When you have pulled down all the Institutions of the Country, what do you expect but ruins?  That Radicalism of yours has its day.  You have to go through a wrestle like mine to understand it.  You say, the day is fine, let’s have our game.  Old England pays for it!  Then you’ll find how you love the old land of your birth—­the noblest ever called a nation!—­with your Corn Law Repeals!—­eh, Dacier?—­You ’ll own it was the devil tempted you.  I hear you apologizing.  Pray God, it mayn’t be too late!’

He looked up at the windows.  ‘She may be sinking!’

‘Have no fears,’ Redworth said; ‘Mrs. Warwick would send for you.’

’She would.  Diana Warwick would be sure to send.  Next to my wife, Diana Warwick’s . . . she’d send, never fear.  I dread that room.  I’d rather go through a regiment of sabres—­though it ’s over now.  And Diana Warwick stood it.  The worst is over, you told me.  By heaven! women are wonderful creatures.  But she hasn’t a peer for courage.  I could trust her—­most extraordinary thing; that marriage of hers!—­not a soul has ever been able to explain it:—­trust her to the death.’

Redworth left them, and Sir Lukin ejaculated on the merits of Diana Warwick to Dacier.  He laughed scornfully:  ’And that’s the woman the world attacks for want of virtue!  Why, a fellow hasn’t a chance with her, not a chance.  She comes out in blazing armour if you unmask a battery.  I don’t know how it might be if she were in love with a fellow.  I doubt her thinking men worth the trouble.  I never met the man.  But if she were to take fire, Troy ’d be nothing to it.  I wonder whether we might go in:  I dread the house.’

Dacier spoke of departing.

‘No, no, wait,’ Sir Lukin begged him.  ’I was talking about women.  They are the devil—­or he makes most use of them:  and you must learn to see the cloven foot under their petticoats, if you’re to escape them.  There’s no protection in being in love with your wife; I married for love; I am, I always have been, in love with her; and I went to the deuce.  The music struck up