"It isn't that I want them to take sides," said the Duke, "but I want to get them interested in me. It was the only method I could think of. You see I'm naturally of a shy and shrinking disposition, and I find it difficult to convey to comparative strangers a sense of my all-round excellences."
He was paying one of his rare visits to Alicia in her own home.
The outward and visible result of his hurricane courtship glittered on the third finger of her left hand.
"But surely," she urged a little impatiently—she was a real girl and this is a true story—"you have some plans for the future, you do not intend to end your days in Brockley?"
He nodded his head.
"I can imagine nothing more satisfying," he said, "than to pass to the dark beyond, to the bourne from which—in the midst of mine own people."
"The calm way in which you have appropriated us all," she said, with a smile which was half amusement and half vexation, "is too appalling. But, dear, there is me."
"There is you," he repeated, with a twinkle in his eyes, "I have thought of that—you shall stay and share my glories."
"In the suburbs?"
She lifted her eyebrows.