“If you cannot, you may as well give it up,” said Mrs. Harold Smith. “But if you can do it—if you can go through with it in that manner—my own opinion is that your chance of success would not be bad. The fact is,” added the sister after awhile, during which her brother was continuing his walk and meditating on the difficulties of his position—“the fact is, you men never understand a woman; you give her credit neither for her strength, nor for her weakness. You are too bold, and too timid: you think she is a fool and tell her so, and yet never can trust her to do a kind action. Why should she not marry you with the intention of doing you a good turn? After all, she would lose very little: there is the estate, and if she redeemed it, it would belong to her as well as to you.”
“It would be a good turn, indeed. I fear I should be too modest to put it to her in that way.”
“Her position would be much better as your wife than it is at present. You are good-humoured and good-tempered, you would intend to treat her well, and, on the whole, she would be much happier as Mrs. Sowerby, of Chaldicotes, than she can be in her present position.”
“If she cared about being married, I suppose she could be a peer’s wife to-morrow.”
“But I don’t think she cares about being a peer’s wife. A needy peer might perhaps win her in the way that I propose to you; but then a needy peer would not know how to set about it. Needy peers have tried—half a dozen I have no doubt—and have failed, because they have pretended that they were in love with her. It may be difficult, but your only chance is to tell her the truth.”
“And where shall I do it?”
“Here if you choose; but her own house will be better.”
“But I never can see her there—at least, not alone. I believe that she never is alone. She always keeps a lot of people round her in order to stave off her lovers. Upon my word, Harriet, I think I’ll give it up. It is impossible that I should make such a declaration to her as that you propose.”
“Faint heart, Nat—you know the rest.”
“But the poet never alluded to such wooing as that you have suggested. I suppose I had better begin with a schedule of my debts, and make reference, if she doubts me, to Fothergill, the sheriff’s officers, and the Tozer family.”