Then Harry had to repeat his veni, vidi, vici after his own fashion. "Of course I interfered with him. How is a fellow to help himself? We both of us were spooning on the same girl, and of course she had to decide it."
"And she decided for you?"
"I fancy she did. At any rate I decided for her, and I mean to have her."
Then Mr. Prosper was, for him, very gracious in his congratulations, saying all manner of good things of Miss Mountjoy. "I think you'd like her, Uncle Prosper." Mr. Prosper did not doubt but that he would "appease the solicitor." He also had heard of Miss Mountjoy, and what he had heard had been much to the "young lady's credit." Then he asked a few questions as to the time fixed for the marriage. Here Harry was obliged to own that there were difficulties. Miss Mountjoy had promised not to marry for three years without her mother's consent. "Three years!" said Mr. Prosper. "Then I shall be dead and buried." Harry did not tell his uncle that in that case the difficulty might probably vanish, as the same degree of fate which had robbed him of his poor uncle would have made him owner of Buston. In such a case as that Mrs. Mountjoy might probably give way.
"But why is the young lady to be kept from marriage for three years? Does she wish it?"
Harry said that he did not exactly think that Miss Mountjoy, on her own behalf, did wish for so prolonged a separation. "The fact is, sir, that Mrs. Mountjoy is not my best friend. This nephew of hers, Mountjoy Scarborough, has always been her favorite."
"But he's a man that always loses his money at cards."
"He's to have all Tretton now, it seems."
"And what does the young lady say?"
"All Tretton won't move her. I'm not a bit afraid. I've got her word, and that's enough for me. How it is that her mother should think it possible;—that's what I do not know."