"An ignoble trick to play on a woman," murmured Wykeham.
But his protest had become very feeble. He saw nothing in the suggestion that shocked his religious scruples, for the rest he cared but little. The victim was only a tailor's daughter after all, and Stowmaries—his friend—would not be the one to repudiate his marriage vows.
"Bah! a tailor's daughter!" was the gist of the argument in favour of the scheme.
"She shall have full compensation," quoth my lord Stowmaries somewhat tonelessly, for his throat felt parched and his tongue seemed to be several sizes too large for his mouth.
He drank down a large bumper full of sherry into which Ayloffe had unobtrusively thrown a dash of raw brandy.
"Have you forgotten, gentlemen," now said gallant Sir John lustily, "that my lord of Stowmaries will give seventy thousand pounds to the friend who will help him in his need. A fortune methinks, which should tempt any young gallant in search of romantic adventure and a pretty wife."
"But the details, man! the details!" came from every side, "surely you have thought of them!"
"And of the risks!" suggested Lord Rochester, who was practical, and who had oft suffered because of his gallant adventures.
"There are no risks, gentlemen," quoth Sir John Ayloffe, "not to us at any rate, nor yet to my lord Stowmaries. As for the tailor and his family, believe me they will be so covered with ridicule, that they will not cause his lordship a moment's anxiety. Just think on it! To give away one's daughter to a man who is not her husband! to greet him with festivities and merrimaking, to kill the fatted calf in honour of the man who brings dishonour into one's home! Nay! Nay! The breeches-maker of Paris will have cause to keep silent after the adventure. The maid perchance will retire into a convent, and the gallant adventurer can brave the world in comfort with seventy thousand pounds in his pocket."
"Bravo! Well said!—But the details?—how will you work, it, Ayloffe?"