The squire sipped his claret, but at the moment said nothing. There was a quiet, manly, but yet modest determination about his son that he had hardly noticed before. Frank had become legally of age, legally a man, when he was twenty-one. Nature, it seems, had postponed the ceremony till he was twenty-two. Nature often does postpone the ceremony even to a much later age;—sometimes, altogether forgets to accomplish it.
The squire continued to sip his claret; he had to think over the matter a while before he could answer a statement so deliberately made by his son.
"I think I may say so," continued Frank, with perhaps unnecessary modesty. "She is so honest that, had she not intended it, she would have said so honestly. Am I right, father, in thinking that, as regards Mary, personally, you would not reject her as a daughter-in-law?"
"Personally!" said the squire, glad to have the subject presented to him in a view that enabled him to speak out. "Oh, no; personally, I should not object to her, for I love her dearly. She is a good girl. I do believe she is a good girl in every respect. I have always liked her; liked to see her about the house. But—"
"I know what you would say, father." This was rather more than the squire knew himself. "Such a marriage is imprudent."
"It is more than that, Frank; I fear it is impossible."
"Impossible! No, father; it is not impossible."
"It is impossible, Frank, in the usual sense. What are you to live upon? What would you do with your children? You would not wish to see your wife distressed and comfortless."
"No, I should not like to see that."
"You would not wish to begin life as an embarrassed man and end it as a ruined man. If you were now to marry Miss Thorne such would, I fear, doubtless be your lot."