The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 190: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A = ShCOND SERIES THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT. 17 THE COUNTESS OF CURZON. object of his importunity hurried away in the con- trary direction. Baffled, enraged, disappointed, and humiliated, the Earl of Curzon re-entered his dwelling: and after drinking a tumbler of claret to cool the throat which was parched with the fever of over- wrought excitement, he flang himself upon a sofa and gave way to his unpleasurable reflections. Everything seemed to be going wrong with him— all circumstances were combining for his annoy- ance. His pecuniary affairs were in no agreeable pasition—he had failed to possess himself of Voe- netia, whose charms had well nigh maddened him —the suspicion which he entertained relative to his wife, was still strong enough to goad and tor- ture him cruelly—and now the rebuff he had expe- rienced from Gertrude crowned his humiliation and annoyance. He was just in that humour when @ man would give anything to be able to vent his apite upon the head of some victim, either for a real or an imaginary offence. 23 * Suddenly a thought struck him. His wife was from home—and Gertrude was also absent. The former would not, in all probability, return until eleven o’clock or perhaps midnight; and the latter had no doubt received permission to pass the eveu- ing with her friends. What if the Earl were to search in Editha’s boudoir to see if he could dis- cover the note which she had received in the morning, or any other letters that might afford a clue to her conduct? Inspired with this idea, Curzon hastened up- stairs—entered the boudoir—and, closing the door, began to search all the drawers. He however dis- covered nothing of apy consequence. Editha’s writing-desk stood upon a table: but it was locked. He took out his own bunch of keys and tried every one of them at all corresponding with the size of the lock. The last key was found to fit— and the desk was opened. One of the compartments was filled with letters, which the Earl proceeded to examine with careful comliclbooks.com