‘She is very young?’
‘Sixteen on our wedding-day. That’s the beauty of it. If she had been a day older it would have been a different thing. Not that they could have spoilt her,—she is a thoroughbred by nature, and no mistake.’
‘How did your acquaintance begin?’
‘This way,’ said Arthur, leaning back, and twirling a chair on one of its legs for a pivot. ‘Fitzhugh would have me come down for a fortnight’s fishing to Wrangerton. There’s but one inn there fit to put a dog to sleep in, and when we got there we found the house turned out of window for a ball, all the partitions down on the first floor, and we driven into holes to be regaled with distant fiddle-squeak. So Fitzhugh’s Irish blood was up for a dance, and I thought I might as well give in to it, for the floor shook so that there was no taking a cigar in peace. So you see the stars ordained it, and it is of no use making a row about one’s destiny,’ concluded Arthur, in a sleepy voice, ceasing to spin the chair.
‘That was your first introduction?’
‘Ay. After that, one was meeting the Mosses for ever; indeed, we had to call on the old fellow to get leave for fishing in that water of Lord St. Erme’s. He has a very pretty sort of little place out of the town close to the park, and—and somehow the weather was too bright for any sport, and the stream led by their garden.’
‘I perceive,’ said John.
‘Well, I saw I was in for it, and had nothing for it but to go through with it. Anything for a quiet life.’
‘A new mode of securing it,’ said John, indignant at his nonchalance.
‘There you don’t display your wonted sagacity,’ returned Arthur coolly. ‘You little know what I have gone through on your account. If you had been sound-winded, you would have saved me no end of persecution.’