Whether the major did marry the lady or whether he did not, his allowance was to be continued to him, the archdeacon being perfectly willing to trust himself in the matter to the pledge which had received from Miss Crawley.  All that he had required from his son was simply this—­that he should pull down the bills advertising the sale of his effects.  Was any desire more rational?  The sale had been advertised for a day just one week in advance of the assizes, and the time must have been selected—­so thought the archdeacon—­with a malicious intention.  Why, at any rate, should the things be sold before anyone knew whether the father of the young lady was or was not to be regarded as a thief?  And why should the things be sold at all, when the archdeacon had tacitly withdrawn his threats—­when he had given his son to understand that the allowance would still be paid quarterly with the customary archidiaconal regularity, and that no alteration was intended in those settlements under which the Plumstead foxes would, in the ripeness of time, become the property of the major himself.  It was thus that the archdeacon looked at it, and as he did so, he thought that his son was the most cross-grained of men.

But the major had his own way of looking at the matter.  He had, he flattered himself, dealt very fairly with his father.  When he had first made up his mind to make Miss Crawley his wife, he had told his father of his intention.  The archdeacon declared that, if he did so, such and such results would follow—­results which, as was apparent to everyone, would make it indispensable that the major should leave Cosby Lodge.  The major had never complained.  So he told himself.  He had simply said to his father—­’I shall do as I have said.  You can do as you have said.  Therefore, I shall prepare to leave Cosby Lodge.’  He had so prepared; and as a part of that preparation, the auctioneer’s bills had been stuck up on the posts and walls.  Then the archdeacon had gone to work surreptitiously with the lady—­the reader will understand that we are still following the workings of the major’s mind—­and having succeeded in obtaining a pledge which he had been wrong to demand, came forward very graciously to withdraw his threats.  He withdrew his threats because he had succeeded in his object by other means.  The major knew nothing of the kiss that had been given, of the two tears that had trickled down his father’s nose, of the generous epithets which the archdeacon had applied to Grace.  He did not guess how nearly his father had yielded altogether beneath the pressure of Grace’s charms—­how willing he was to yield altogether at the first decent opportunity.  His father had obtained a pledge from Grace that she would not marry in certain circumstances—­as to which circumstances the major was strongly resolved that they should form no bar to his marriage—­and then came forward with his eager demand that the sale should be stopped!  The major could not submit