"Dashers!" repeated Mauleverer; "true, haberdashers!" Long Ned now,
having in the way of his profession acquitted himself tolerably well at
the card-table, thought he had purchased the right to parade himself
through the rooms, and show the ladies what stuff a Pepper could be made
of.

Leaning with his left hand on Tomlinson's arm, and employing the right in
fanning himself furiously with his huge chapeau bras, the lengthy
adventurer stalked slowly along, now setting out one leg jauntily, now
the other, and ogling "the ladies" with a kind of Irish look,--namely, a
look between a wink and a stare.

Released from the presence of Clifford, who kept a certain check on his
companions, the apparition of Ned became glaringly conspicuous; and
wherever he passed, a universal whisper succeeded.

"Who can he be?" said the widow Matemore. "'T is a droll creature; but
what a head of hair!"

"For my part," answered the spinster Sneerall, "I think he is a linen-
draper in disguise; for I heard him talk to his companion of 'tape.'"

"Well, well," thought Mauleverer, "it would be but kind to seek out
Brandon, and hint to him in what company his niece seems to have fallen!"
And so thinking, he glided to the corner where, with a gray-headed old
politician, the astute lawyer was conning the affairs of Europe.

In the interim the second dance had ended, and Clifford was conducting
Lucy to her seat, each charmed with the other, when he found himself