twelve o'clock yet, and there is every probability that some new form
of sentimental persecution is in store for me before the evening. Thus
far, these lines contain a perfectly true statement of Mrs. Badgery's
conduct towards me since I entered on the possession of _my_ house and
_her_ shrine. What am I to do?--that is the point I wish to insist
on--what am I to do? How am I to get away from the memory of Mr.
Badgery, and the unappeasable grief of his disconsolate widow? Any
other species of invasion it is possible to resist; but how is a man
placed in my unhappy and unparalleled circumstances to defend himself?
I can't keep a dog ready to fly at Mrs. Badgery. I can't charge her at
a police-court with being oppressively fond of the house in which her
husband died. I can't set man-traps for a woman, or prosecute a
weeping widow as a trespasser and a nuisance. I am helplessly involved
in the unrelaxing folds of Mrs. Badgery's crape veil. Surely there was
no exaggeration in my language when I said that I was a sufferer under
a perfectly new grievance! Can anybody advise me? Has anybody had even
the remotest experience of the peculiar form of persecution which I am
now enduring? If nobody has, is there any legal gentleman in the
United Kingdom who can answer the all-important question which appears
at the head of this narrative? I began by asking that question because
it was uppermost in my mind. It is uppermost in my mind still, and I
therefore beg leave to conclude appropriately by asking it again:
Is there any law in England which will protect me from Mrs. Badgery?
END OF VOL. I.
LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, AND CHARING
CROSS.
End of Project Gutenberg's My Miscellanies, Vol. 1 (of 2), by Wilkie Collins