CHAPTER XLVII
Nemesis
But in spite of all these joyful tidings it must, alas! be remembered
that Poena, that just but Rhadamanthine goddess, whom we moderns
ordinarily call Punishment, or Nemesis when we wish to speak of her
goddess-ship, very seldom fails to catch a wicked man though she
have sometimes a lame foot of her own, and though the wicked man may
possibly get a start of her. In this instance the wicked man had been
our unfortunate friend Mark Robarts; wicked in that he had wittingly
touched pitch, gone to Gatherum Castle, ridden fast mares across the
country to Cobbold's Ashes, and fallen very imprudently among the
Tozers; and the instrument used by Nemesis was Mr. Tom Towers of the
_Jupiter_, than whom, in these our days, there is no deadlier scourge
in the hands of that goddess. In the first instance, however, I must
mention, though I will not relate, a little conversation which took
place between Lady Lufton and Mr. Robarts. That gentleman thought it
right to say a few words more to her ladyship respecting those money
transactions. He could not but feel, he said, that he had received
that prebendal stall from the hands of Mr. Sowerby; and under such
circumstances, considering all that had happened, he could not be
easy in his mind as long as he held it.
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