"Yes; but we all know what that may mean, whereas if she comes to live with you, Zack will be so proud of her as if she were his very own sister."
Jenny was staggered by the pertinacity of this wooing and made a slip.
"Yes; but when does he want to marry me?"
The pleader was not slow to take hold of this.
"Then you'll consider it, eh?"
"I never said so," Jenny replied in a quick attempt to retrieve her blunder.
"Well, he wants to marry you now at once."
"But I couldn't. For one thing I couldn't leave the theater all in a hurry. It would look so funny. Besides——"
"Well," Zack said, "Don't worry the maid, William John, but leave her to find out her own mind and I'll bide here along till she do know it."
Mr. Corin dwelt on the magnanimity of his friend and having, as he thought, made a skillful attack on Jenny's prejudice, retired to let his arguments sink in. He had effected even more than he imagined by his cool statement of the proposal. Put forward by him, devoid of all passion and eccentricity of language, it seemed a very business-like affair. Jenny began to think how such a step would solve the problem of taking a new house, of moving the furniture, of providing for May, of getting rid of her father, now daily more irritating on account of his besotted manner of life. All the girls at the theater were marrying. It was in the air. She was growing old. The time of romantic adventure was gone. The carnival was petering out in a gloomy banality. Change was imminent in every direction. Why not make a clean sweep of the old life and, escaping to some strange new existence, create a fresh illusion of pleasure? What would her mother have said to this offer? Jenny could not help feeling she would have regarded it with very friendly eyes, would have urged strongly its acceptance. Why, she had even been anxious for Jenny to make a match with a baker; and here was a prosperous man, a religious man, a steady man, inviting her to be mistress almost of a country estate. She wished that Mr. Z. Trewhella were not so willing to wait. It made him appear so sure, so inevitable. And the time for moving was getting very near. Change was in the air. Jenny thought she would sound May's views on the future in case of sudden accident or any deliberate alteration of the present mode of life.