Ashton; and the countess-dowager
walked away with a scarlet face, and an explosion of anger against her
daughter.
Lady Hartledon was not yet callous to the proprieties of life; and the
intrusion on the Ashtons, which her mother confessed to, half frightened,
half shamed her. But the dowager's wrath at having been misled bore down
everything. Dr. Ashton had entered no action whatever against Lord
Hartledon; had never thought of doing it.
"And you, you wicked, ungrateful girl, to come home to me with such an
invention, and cause me to start off on a fool's errand! Do you suppose I
should have gone and humbled myself to those people, but for hoping to
bring the parson to a sense of what he was doing in going-in for those
enormous damages?"
"I have not come home to you with any invention, mamma. Dr. Ashton has
entered the action."
"He has not," raved the dowager. "It is an infamous hoax you have played
off upon me. You couldn't find any excuse for your husband's staying in
London, and so invented this. What with you, and what with Kirton's
ingratitude, I shall be driven out of house and home!"
"I won't say another word until you are calm and can talk common sense,"
said Maude, leaning back in her chair, and putting down her prayer-book.
"Common sense! What am I talking but common sense? When a child begins to
mislead her own mother, the world ought to come to an end.
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