“Excuse me, Mr. Hall, but I am obliged to ask you some personal questions now. Are you engaged to Miss Lloyd?”
“I beg your pardon?”
His continued requests for me to repeat my questions irritated me beyond endurance. Of course it was a bluff to gain time, but he did it so politely, I couldn't rebuke him.
“Are you engaged to Miss Lloyd?” I repeated.
“No, I think not,” he said slowly. “She wants to break it off, and I, as a poor man, should not stand in the way of her making a brilliant marriage. She has many opportunities for such, as her uncle often told me, and I should be selfish indeed, now that she herself is poor, to hold her to her promise to me.”
The hypocrite! To lay on Florence the responsibility for breaking the engagement. Truly, she was well rid of him, and I hoped I could convince her of the fact.
“But she is not so poor,” I said. “Mr. Philip Crawford told me he intends to provide for her amply. And I'm sure that means a fair-sized fortune, for the Crawfords are generous people.”
Gregory Hall's manner changed.
“Did Philip Crawford say that?” he cried. “Are you sure?”
“Of course I'm sure, as he said it to me.”