"Could I depend upon you?"
"Yes, by—"
"Stop; don't swear! I can believe you better without it. Sit down again, and listen to what I have to say."
"I have thought much of all this of late; a voice within me seems to say that an alliance with my daughter would be for the good of your soul. Yes, after much anxiety and deliberation, I had thought of fixing the wedding for next Sunday—"
"I beg your par— What do you say?" cried Worse, jumping up from his chair. "Ah, madame, you are a devil of a woman!"
"But now, when I find that a sudden order to go to sea can tear you away from your family, and expose you to danger and to temptations, which can easily—we know how easily—choke the good seed, I cannot think of entrusting my child, my beloved Sarah, to you."
"But, Madame Torvestad, I won't go! I will tell the Consul that he must get some other person. I swear to you I won't go!"
"Not this time, perhaps; but the next time that your partner wants—"
"Never! If I get Sarah, I promise—"
He stopped, and, as he looked out of the window, he caught sight of the Hope's top-gallant yards away out in Sandsgaard Bay.