"Would you have the heart to disappoint me, now that the victory is won;—now that it may be made our own by your help? And what is it that I am asking you to do? If this man were bad,—if he were such a one as your father, if he were drunken, cruel, ill-conditioned, or even heavy, foolish, or deformed; had you been told stories to set you against him, as that he had been false with other women, I could understand it. In that case we would at any rate find out the truth before we went on. But of this man we hear that he is good, and pleasant; an excellent young man, who has endeared himself to all who know him. Such a one that all the girls of his own standing in the world would give their eyes to win him."
"Let some girl win him then who cares for him."
"But he wishes to win you, dearest."
"Not because he loves me. How can he love me when he never saw me? How can I love him when I never saw him?"
"He wishes to win you because he has heard what you are, and because he knows that by doing so he can set things right which for many years have been wrong."
"It is because he would get all this money."
"You would both get it. He desires nothing unfair. Whatever he takes from you, so much he will give. And it is not only for this generation. Is it nothing to you that the chiefs of your own family who shall come after you shall be able to hold their heads up among other British peers? Would you not wish that your own son should come to be Earl Lovel, with wealth sufficient to support the dignity?"
"I don't think it would make him happy, mamma."
"There is something more in this, Anna, than I can understand. You used not to be so. When we talked of these things in past years you used not to be indifferent."
"I was not asked then to—to—marry a man I did not care for."