“ ‘I am tired of being insulted by you.’ My client will tell your Ludship that these so-called insults consisted in her calling him ‘the limit’⁠—a very mild expression, I venture to suggest, in all the circumstances.”

Val glanced sideways at his mother’s impassive face, it had a hunted look in the eyes. “Poor mother,” he thought, and touched her arm with his own. The voice behind droned on.

“ ‘I am going to live a new life.⁠— M. D. ’ ”

“And next day, me Lud, the respondent left by the steamship Tuscarora for Buenos Aires. Since then we have nothing from him but a cabled refusal in answer to the letter which my client wrote the following day in great distress, begging him to return to her. With your Ludship’s permission, I shall now put Mrs. Dartie in the box.”