“Oh, very well, very well—­I suppose you have heard the terms upon which I am prepared to consent to your engagement.”

“Yes, Arthur has told me; and it is to implore you to modify them that we have come.  Father, they are cruel terms—­to be dead to each other for a whole long year.”

“I cannot help it, Angela.  I am sorry to inflict pain upon either of you; but I have arrived at them entirely in your own interests, and after a great deal of anxious thought.  Believe me, a year’s probation will be very good for both of you; it is not probable that, where my only child is concerned, I should wish to do anything except what is for her happiness!”

Arthur looked rebellion at Angela.  Philip saw it, and added: 

“Of course you can defy me—­it is, I believe, rather the fashion for girls, nowadays, to do so—­but, if you do, you must both clearly understand, first, that you cannot marry without my consent till the first of May next, or very nearly a year hence, when Angela comes of age, and that I shall equally forbid all intercourse in the interval; and secondly, that when you do so, it will be against my wish, and that I shall cut her name out of my will, for this property is only entailed in the male line.  It now only remains for me to ask you if you agree to my conditions.”

Angela answered him, speaking very slowly and clearly: 

“I accept them on my own behalf, not because I understand them, or think them right, or because of your threats, but because, though you do not care for me, I am your daughter, and should obey you—­and believe that you wish to do what is best for me.  That is why I accept, although it will make my life wretched for a year.”

“Do you hear what she says?” said Philip, turning to Arthur.  “Do you also agree?”

He answered boldly, and with some temper (how would he have answered could he have seen the thousand pound cheque that was reposing upon the table in Philip’s rusty pocket-book, and known for what purpose it came there?).

“If it had not been Angela’s wish, I would never have agreed.  I think your terms preposterous, and I only hope that you have some satisfactory reason for them; for you have not shown us any.  But since she takes this view of the matter, and because, so far as I can see, you have completely cornered us, I suppose I must.  You are her father, and cannot in nature wish to thwart her happiness; and if you have any plan of causing her to forget me—­I don’t want to be conceited, but I believe that it will fail.”  Here Angela smiled somewhat sadly.  “So, unless one of us dies before the year is up, I shall come back to be married on the 9th of June next year.”

“Really, my dear Heigham, your way of talking is so aggressive, that some fathers might be tempted to ask you not to come back at all; but perhaps it is, under the circumstances, excusable.”

“You would probably think so, if you were in my place,” blurted out Arthur.