"I still think that this is a matter for Miss Stafford's decision," said the Colonel. "You really cannot expect me to place before her all the disadvantages of my own offer in the strong light in which you review them."
John Merton paused a moment; then he said:
"I will not take up more than five minutes more of your time, Colonel Orpington, but I should like just to discuss this question perhaps rather more from your point of view. What I have hitherto mentioned, you say concerns Miss Stafford; but now about yourself. Supposing events to follow as you have proposed----"
"As I have every expectation they will," said the Colonel, pleasantly smiling.
"You have a right to that expectation," said John. "Well, supposing they so fall out, you are too much a man of the world to expect that your--well, what you are pleased to call your love for Miss Stafford will last for ever."
"It will be uncommonly unlike any other love if it did," said the Colonel.
"Exactly; it will run its course and die out, as similar passions have, I should imagine, expired in previous years. What do you propose to do then?"
"I decline to anticipate such a state of affairs," said the Colonel; "sufficient for the day-----"
"Exactly," said John Merton; "only in this case the evil once done would be sufficient for the rest of your days on earth. Do you imagine that a girl of Fanny Stafford's proud temperament would condescend to accept anything at your hands, when she knew that your feelings for her had died out, and that you were probably spreading for another woman exactly the same nets into which she had been entrapped? I know her well enough to be certain that under such circumstances she would refuse, not merely to be supported by you, but even to see you. What would become of her then? She would take to suicide, the usual resort of her class."
"Most likely she would take to suicide," said the Colonel.