Later in the day I was told that Mrs. Rymer had called, and wished to “pay her respects.”
I refused to see her. Whatever claim she might have otherwise had on my consideration had been forfeited by the infamy of her conduct, when she intercepted my letter to Susan. Her sense of injury on receiving my message was expressed in writing, and was sent to me the same evening. The last sentence in her letter was characteristic of the woman.
“However your pride may despise me,” she wrote, “I am indebted to you for the rise in life that I have always desired. You may refuse to see me—but you can’t prevent my being the mother-in-law of a gentleman.”
Soon afterward, I received a visit which I had hardly ventured to expect. Busy as he was in London, my doctor came to see me. He was not in his usual
