“Oh, what a Pecksniff the fellow is! The biggest hypocrite on the face of the earth, but useful—oh, yes, useful! And so you are Grace Peyton, are you?” turning his glittering eyes upon Lady Grace, who shrank back, half-frightened. “Hem! I should think you’d make a good match with Cecil.”
“Have you forgotten that we are engaged, Cecil and I, marquis?” she murmured, bending over him.
“Engaged, are you?” he said. “Rather early, isn’t it? But I’ve no objection. Engaged to Cecil, eh? By gad, I pity you if he has any of the Stoyle temper! The Stoyles are the worst husbands in the world, so they say, and I think it’s true. He’ll make you wish you were dead before you have been married twelve months!”
“Come away, Grace,” said Cecil, pale and stern, and he led her out of the room.
“Oh! Cecil, I am sorry!” she murmured, clinging to his arm, and looking up into his face. “And we were to be married soon, too!”
“Yes,” he said, “I am afraid the wedding must be put off, Grace!” and, though he spoke in accents of regret, a guilty thrill of relief shot through him. “Poor old man! Poor old man! We were never on very affectionate terms, but it hurts me to see him like this!”
“And he may remain like it for ever so long!” she said, raising her eyes, as her head lay on his breast. “For months, perhaps. Do—do you think it would matter if we had a quiet, a very quiet, wedding, Cecil?”
He frowned.
“I am afraid it isn’t possible, Grace,” he replied, and again he was conscious of the same guilty thrill of relief.
She drew a long breath, and pulled irritably at the lace on her sleeve.