“If you would only allow me to explain myself, sir, you would view my conduct in a totally different light. I am ready to marry to-morrow, if the lady will have me.”
“The devil you are! So you have got a lady in your eye, after all? Why in Heaven’s name couldn’t you tell me so before? Never mind, I’ll forgive you everything, now I know you have laid your hand on a wife. Fill your glass again. Here’s her health in a bumper. By-the-by, who is she?”
“I’ll tell you directly, admiral. When we began this conversation, I mentioned that I was a little anxious—”
“She’s not one of my round dozen of nice girls—aha, Master George, I see that in your face already! Why are you anxious?”
“I am afraid you will disapprove of my choice, sir.”
“Don’t beat about the bush! How the deuce can I say whether I disapprove or not, if you won’t tell me who she is?”
“She is the eldest daughter of Andrew Vanstone, of Combe-Raven.”
“Who!!!”
“Miss Vanstone, sir.”
The admiral put down his glass of wine untasted.
“You’re right, George,” he said. “I do disapprove of your choice —strongly disapprove of it.”
“Is it the misfortune of her birth, sir, that you object to?”
“God forbid! the misfortune of her birth is not her fault, poor thing. You know as well as I do, George, what I object to.”
“You object to her sister?”
“Certainly! The most liberal man alive might object to her sister, I think.”
“It’s hard, sir, to make Miss Vanstone suffer for her sister’s faults.”
“Faults, do you call them? You have a mighty convenient memory, George, when your own interests are concerned.”
“Call them crimes if you like, sir—I say again, it’s hard on Miss Vanstone. Miss Vanstone’s life is pure of all reproach. From first to last she has borne her hard lot with such patience, and sweetness, and courage as not one woman in a thousand would have shown in her place. Ask Miss Garth, who has known her from childhood. Ask Mrs. Tyrrel, who blesses the day when she came into the house—”
“Ask a fiddlestick’s end! I beg your pardon, George, but you are enough to try the patience of a saint. My good fellow, I don’t deny Miss Vanstone’s virtues. I’ll admit, if you like, she’s the best woman that ever put on a petticoat. That is not the question—”
“Excuse me, admiral—it is the question, if she is to be my wife.”
“Hear me out, George; look at it from my point of view, as well as your own. What did your cousin Noel do? Your cousin Noel fell a victim, poor fellow, to one of the vilest conspiracies I ever heard of, and the prime mover of that conspiracy was Miss Vanstone’s damnable sister. She deceived him in the most infamous manner; and as soon as she was down for a handsome legacy in his will, she had the poison ready to take his life. This is the