“And indignant, probably. Yet there are two sides to the subject. It is rather trying to an old man, when his son writes suddenly, and insists upon bringing home a daughter-in-law, however charming, in six weeks; natural, too, that the father should urge,—'Take time to consider, my dear boy.'”
“Very natural.”
“Nay, should he go further, and wish some information respecting the lady who is to become one of his family—desire to know her family, in order to judge more of one on whom are to depend his son's happiness and his house and honour, you would not think him unjust or tyrannical?”
“Of course not. We,” I said, with some pride, alas! more pride than truth, “we should exact the same.”
“I know Sir William, well, and he trusts me. You will, perhaps, understand how this trust and the—the flexible character of his son, make me feel painfully responsible. Also, I know what youth is when thwarted. If that young fellow should go wrong, it would be to me—you cannot conceive how painful it would be to me.”
His hands nervously working one over the other, the sorrowful expression of his eyes, indicated sufficient emotion to make me extremely grieved for this good-hearted man. I am sure he is good-hearted.
I said I could not, of course, feel the same interest that he did in Captain Treherne, but that I wished the young man well.
“Can you tell me one thing; is your sister really attached to him?”
This sudden question, which I had so many times asked of myself—ought I to reply to it? Could I? Only by a prevarication.
“Mr. Treherne is the best person from whom to obtain that information.”