“How do you make that out?”
“Wasn’t we pledged four year ago, and I took his ring, and there’s Maggie Tuke engaged years after me, and nicely set up in her own house now, with a gramaphone and a big glass—yes, and Nellie Watkin too; and I’ve got to wait and wait till Mrs. Hogben pleases. She won’t give up Tom, so there it is! Oh, of course she’s all butter and sugar to a good lodger like you, but she’s as hard as a turnpike, and she’s waiting on till my grandmother comes forward—and that she’ll never do. Why, she grudges me a bit of chocolate, let alone a fortin’.”
“Oh, so that’s it, is it?”
“Yes, that’s it, since you must know; and I tell you I’m not going on playing this ’ere waiting game no longer—I’m about fed up, as they say; I’m twenty-six, and I’ve told Ernest as I’m going to break it off with Hogben.”
“Come now, which do you like the best?” asked Wynyard, amazed at his own impertinence, “Tom or Ernest?”
“Why, Tom, of course, but what’s the good?”
“Look here, will you promise not to hate me—and will you let me see what I can do?”
For a moment she gazed at him with an air of profound mistrust; at last she muttered in a peevish voice—
“Yes, you can’t make things no worse, anyway—and that’s certain sure.”
This was not a very gracious permission, but Miss Topham wiped her eyes and held out her hand; at the moment, by most provoking bad luck, the Rector and his daughter dashed by in a dog-cart, and the former, recognising him, called back a cheery “Good-night, Owen!”