The Hillyars and the Burtons by Henry Kingsley

THE first thing Mr. Compton did, on hearing of Lady Hillyar's disappearance, was to take a cab and dash off to the Nalders' in Grosvenor Place, in the wild hope that Mrs. Nalder might know something about Sir George Hillyar's whereabouts, and that she might enable him to communicate personally with him. The house was blazing with lights, and the carriages were flashing rapidly up to the door; but kind Nalder came down to him. Seeing no one but a gentle and mild- looking old gentleman before him, he ventured to talk his native language, which he would not have ventured to do for his life in his own drawing-room, and explained to Mr. Compton that Mrs. N. had got on a tarnation tall hop,--a regular Old Tar River breakdown; and, seeing Mr. Compton was in full dress, he hoped his business would keep, and that he would jine 'em and shake a toe. Having relieved his heart by so much of the dear old prairie talk, and seeing Mr. Compton was anxious and distressed, he began to speak in diplomatic American,-- absolutely perfect English, slightly Frenchified in style, and spoken a little through the nose; English which, under the present presidency, seems to be going out of fashion, as Webster's English gives way to Lincoln's, and M'Clellan's to Grant's.

He was very much distressed at what Mr. Compton told him. Lady Hillyar's jealousy against Mrs. Nalder, to which he had so delicately alluded, was an old source of distress to him and his wife. As for their having any knowledge whatever of Sir George Hillyar's whereabouts, they had actually none at all; and, if he might speak without giving offence, had no wish for any.