'Simply to have a positive answer from Mr. Godolphin, if he will, together with his brother, allow me, when the usual mourning is over, to address their sister with proposals of marriage; which in fact they have no right to prevent. And if Mr. Godolphin refuses——'
'What, if he refuses?'
'I shall take my son into my own care, and wait till Lady Adelina will herself exert that freedom which is now her's.'
'Godolphin doats on the child. Nothing, I am persuaded, will induce him to part with it.'
'Not part with it? He must, nay he shall!'
'Pray be calm—pray be quiet. Stay yet a few months—a few weeks.'
'Not a day! Not an hour!'
'Good God! what can be done? Mischief will inevitably happen!'
'I am sorry,' replied Fitz-Edward, 'that you are thus made uneasy. But I cannot recede; and my life has not been pleasant enough lately to make me very solicitous about the event of my explanation with Mr. Godolphin. Conscious, however, that he has some reason to complain of me, I do not wish to increase it. I mean to keep my temper, if I can: but if he suffers his to pass the bounds which one gentleman must observe towards another, I shall not consider myself as the aggressor, or as answerable for the consequences.'