"Saltars without the confounded lord," urged the man pertinaciously.
"No; go on. What were you saying? Yes, that you came to see what sort of a wife I'd make. Who told you to?"
"Your father."
"I don't believe it."
"It's true, though. Your father wanted you to marry me. He kept writing to me from South Africa to keep me up to the scratch, and said he was gathering a fortune for us both. When he came home he called on me and told me you had some folly in your head about this chap Hill, and----"
Eva rose indignantly, "Lord Saltars," she said calmly and distinctly, "I don't allow any one to talk to me in this way. My engagement to Mr. Allen Hill is not a folly. And I don't see why my father should have talked to you about it."
"Because he wanted me to marry you," said Saltars, rising and following her to the fireplace.
Eva placed one slippered foot on the fender, and an elbow on the mantelpiece. She looked angry, but extremely pretty and well-bred. Saltars adopted the same attitude opposite her and looked more like a groom than ever. But the expression of his face was so good-natured that Eva could not feel as angry as she ought to have done.
"I should never have married you," she said, her colour deepening. "I understand that you have other views."
Saltars grew red in his turn. "It's that boy Cain's been talking," he said; "I'll break his head."