Agreeable to his steadfast purpose, Gilead found both the secretary and amanuensis in his room when he reached the Agency. Somewhat high-strung as he was and sensitive to impressions, he seemed conscious of an atmosphere as it were of strain, expectancy, anxiety—he knew not what to call it, but attributed it, whatever it was, to his own suppressed emotions. However, sitting down with the best air of detachment he could muster, he called upon Nestle for his report.
“I have run down the column, sir,” answered the secretary. “There is nothing whatever in it to detain or interest you.”
Did his own feelings mislead him, or was there a hint of tremor in the young man’s voice, a flush of increased colour on his cheek, which belied the easy assurance of his words? He decided, at once and definitely, that the suspicion was born of nothing but his own excited fancy. For the rest he was reassured to find that Miss Halifax herself had evidently passed by the advertisement unnoticing. Had her eyes encountered it, all his chivalrous intent would have been balked at the outset.
“O! very well, Nestle,” he said. “There is, as it happens, a certain advertisement—but you could not have been expected to attach any importance to it from our point of view. Only, as it chanced, I saw a copy of the Daily Post this morning before I reached the office, and—” He broke off, lay back in his chair, drew and emitted a long breath, smiled, and addressed himself resolutely to the two before him. “That is all nothing,” he said, “to the case which is just now most prominently in my mind. It affects our mutual relations, as it does my most earnest wishes. I want you two to eschew diffidence, to eschew formality, to allow me to speak with the freedom engendered of our long and happy intercourse, and to suggest your arranging a date for your marriage with as little delay as possible.”
Having got it out, he rose to his feet. Miss Halifax at the same moment rose hurriedly to hers. Her face was white; her beautiful eyes seemed to have gathered in an instant dark shadows about them.
“Our marriage!” she whispered; and then her breath caught.
Gilead laughed, half protestingly, half melancholy.
“Is it such an appalling prospect?” he said. “You must not allow yourselves to doubt that, for my poor practical part, I will soften its acerbities to you by the best means in my power. Our intimacy, my long debt to you both, will rob that assurance of any suggestion of impertinence or ostentation. I want to see you both settled and happy; I am impatient for the end; and, if I have my reasons, they can hardly be less trenchant ones than your own. I ask you to marry, and to marry soon. If you consider any part of this obligation yours, and desire to liquidate it, there are the means most calculated to give me delight in the settlement. Now I am going to leave you alone to talk the matter over; nor do I intend to refer to it again until invited by yourselves—with the assurance, I shall trust, that you have decided to conform to my wishes.”
He took up his hat, crossed the room, patted the secretary kindly and cheerily on the shoulder, bowed to Miss Halifax and went out.
For minutes after he had left, the two stood silent and transfixed. At length the secretary raised his face with a groan.