“Yes, I know that,” said George, rather surprised that the lawyer’s eagerness to get the matter settled should keep pace with his own. “I was going this morning to a bank in Lombard Street where I keep a particularly modest account, to get the necessary funds.”
“Ah, very well. As it is Saturday, you will have to make haste to get there before the banks close. One of my clerks shall go with you, if you don’t know your way. And in the meantime I think I had better take this young lady to Doctors’ Commons, where she can make the necessary statement to get the licence as well as you could yourself. But, my dear young lady,” he continued, turning to Nouna, who had sprung back from the window in great excitement at this suggestion, “you must really control your high spirits a little and carry yourself with more gravity, or you will certainly be refused the licence on the ground that you are too young.”
In an instant she had flown to a small square looking-glass that was hanging against the wall in a corner of the room, and had parted the curly bush of soft hair that shaded her forehead, and flattened it down into prim unbecoming bands that made her look a couple of years older.
“That’s what we used to do at school, when we wanted to mimic Mrs. Somers,” said she grimly.
And she threw open the door to intimate that she was ready to start.
As the old lawyer slowly rose and prepared for the excursion, he said to George, as he shook his head with would-be pleasantry:
“He need be twice a man, Mr. Lauriston, who weds a child.”
The warning was not needed; George had already begun to be of that opinion.
When he returned from the bank, George found that Nouna and the lawyer had come back, and before he could ask any questions about their expedition, Mr. Smith was begging the young people to come to luncheon with him, and they were hurried off from the office so quickly that George had scarcely time to notice a sudden and most unusual gravity in Nouna, who did not recover her usual high spirits until she found herself among the garish glories of the Holborn Restaurant.
When they had finished luncheon, and Mr. Smith, with many congratulations and pretty speeches, had left them, to seek the domestic delights of his semi-detached villa at Anerley, George remembered that he had forgotten to ask Mr. Angelo for the licence. Nouna answered with a sudden womanly gravity which made him laugh—