“Why, till after she’s got her breach of promise damages out of you. She reckons on at least a hundred and fifty.”
“But—but now she’s hengaged to you she’s got no claim on me!”
“They’ll only have your word at the court that she’s hengaged to me, ’Orace. We ain’t told no one else yet,” observed Mr. Lock, happily. “By the way, I’m bringing her round to see you to-morrow.”
“She’ll never get a hundred and fifty pounds out of me!”
“No; but she’ll have a jolly good try to! In any case, I bet she don’t get less than a clear fifty, so we shan’t be no worse off,” said Mr. Lock. “And on the other hand, your missis—”
Mr. Dobb, with his hands clasped at the back of that garment he euphemistically described as a dressing-gown, stalked moodily about the bedroom for a few moments. The voice of Mrs. Dobb, engaged in a trifling dispute with a neighbour, came shrilly up to him and he shivered.
“All right, I’m beat!” he yielded. “Talk about nourishing a viper!”
“I’ll call round to-morrow morning and go to the bank with you, ’Orace,” said Mr. Lock.
And it was so.
In rather less than six weeks’ time the wedding of Mr. Peter Lock and Miss Louise Radling was solemnized.