Third Period Chapter 40 Dire Necessity

The opinion of the devoted wife encouraged the desperate husband: the
letter was dispatched by the post of that day.

If boisterous good spirits can make a man agreeable at the
dinner-table, then indeed Mr. Vimpany, on his return to the cottage,
played the part of a welcome guest. He was inexhaustible in gallant
attentions to his friend's wife; he told his most amusing stories in
his happiest way; he gaily drank his host's fine white Burgundy, and
praised with thorough knowledge of the subject the succulent French
dishes; he tried Lord Harry with talk on politics, talk on sport, and
(wonderful to relate in these days) talk on literature. The preoccupied
Irishman was equally inaccessible on all three subjects. When the
dessert was placed on the table--still bent on making himself agreeable
to Lady Harry--Mr. Vimpany led the conversation to the subject of
floriculture. In the interests of her ladyship's pretty little garden,
he advocated a complete change in the system of cultivation, and
justified his revolutionary views by misquoting the published work of a
great authority on gardening with such polite obstinacy that Iris
(eager to confute him) went away to fetch the book. The moment he had
entrapped her into leaving the room, the doctor turned to Lord Harry
with a sudden change to the imperative mood in look and manner.

"What have you been about," he asked, "since we had that talk in the
Gardens to-day? Have you looked at your empty purse, and are you wise
enough to take my way of filling it?"