“Well, Kitty,” he said, stroking my hair, “we have half an hour of our own. Let us make the most of it, for it is the last we shall get.”
“What has happened? What have they done?” I cried piteously.
“They have driven a hard bargain with us, dear; but we must submit to it, as it is for your sake. We are not to be engaged, Kitty, for a couple of years at the least, until you have been ‘out,’ and have seen the world a little. Your father thinks you have taken to me because there was no one else, perhaps, and that you are too young to know your own mind.”
“Oh, what nonsense! Why didn’t you tell them different, Tom?”
“My love, I did all I could to keep you, you may be quite sure. But fathers and mothers are hard to deal with in these matters. I couldn’t talk them over; they had made up their minds.”
Tears began to fill my eyes—tears of indignation, as well as of bitter disappointment and grief. “But they didn’t say we were never to have one another, did they?” I inquired, searching for a ray of hope.
“No, Kitty, thank goodness! They had no objection to me personally——”
“I should think not, indeed! I don’t know what they want, if you’re not good enough—the Prince of Wales, perhaps.”
“The Prince of Wales is married already, Kitty; and I don’t think he would make you a better husband than I should, if he weren’t. No, I may have my chance, like any other man, only I must wait all this awful long time for it. How I shall do it, goodness only knows!”
“You may come home in two years, then, and we may be properly engaged?”