"Who can say," asks The Pilgrim's Scrip, "when he is not walking a puppet
to some woman?"

Mrs. Doria would hear no good of Lucy. "I believe," she observed, as
Adrian ventured a shrugging protest in her behalf,--"it is my firm
opinion, that a scullery-maid would turn any of you men round her little
finger--only give her time and opportunity." By dwelling on the arts of
women, she reconciled it to her conscience to do her best to divide the
young husband from his wife till it pleased his father they should live
their unhallowed union again. Without compunction, or a sense of
incongruity, she abused her brother and assisted the fulfilment of his
behests.

So the puppets were marshalled by Mrs. Doria, happy, or sad, or
indifferent. Quite against his set resolve and the tide of his feelings,
Richard found himself standing behind Clare in the church--the very
edifice that had witnessed his own marriage, and heard, "I, Clare Doria,
take thee John Pemberton," clearly pronounced. He stood with black brows
dissecting the arts of the tailor and hairdresser on unconscious John.
The back, and much of the middle, of Mr. Todhunter's head was bald; the
back shone like an egg-shell, but across the middle the artist had drawn
two long dabs of hair from the sides, and plastered them cunningly, so
that all save wilful eyes would have acknowledged the head to be covered.
The man's only pretension was to a respectable juvenility. He had a good
chest, stout limbs, a face inclined to be jolly. Mrs. Doria had no cause
to be put out of countenance at all by the exterior of her son-in-law:
nor was she. Her splendid hair and gratified smile made a light in the
church. Playing puppets must be an immense pleasure to the practical
animal. The Forey bridesmaids, five in number, and one Miss Doria, their