"Well, I can't marry him before he goes, can I?"
It was said flippantly, yet with a certain feeling far back in the mind.
"I don't know about that. Would you if you could, Nan?"
"It might save complications, if he is to be away a year! Suppose some one else were to come home during the year, you know!" added Nan, with undiminished flippancy; yet this was the thought at the back of her brain, and she was entertaining it in bitter earnest.
"Ah, poor Dent!" said Merridew, advisedly, as he grasped her meaning.
"You needn't pity him; he will come back rich, if not with a wife," said the girl whom Devenish knew so well.
Mr. Merridew came back to his point, after a pause intended to break the thread of painful association, as it did.
"But would you marry Ralph if there was time?"
"There isn't time."
"I don't know. I wish I knew the date he sails. It may be later than we think."