So saying, he wrung my hand with a pressure that vouched for his returning strength, and left me. In spite of my walk, I had not much appetite for my breakfast that morning.
CHAPTER XLV — HELPING A LAME DOG OVER A STILE
“Marry, I cannot show it in rhyme;
I have tried.... No, I was not born under a rhyming planet;
Nor I cannot woo in festival terms.”
—Much Ado About Nothing.
“Now, let the verses be bad or good, it plainly amounts to a
regular offer. I don't believe any of the lines are an inch
too long or too short; but if they were, it would be wicked
to alter them, for they are really genuine.”
—Thinks I to Myself.
“We shall have a rare letter from him.”
—Twelfth Night.
IT was usually my custom of an afternoon to read law for a couple of hours, a course of training preparatory to committing myself to the tender mercies of a special pleader; and as Sir John's well-stored library afforded me every facility for so doing, that was the venue I generally selected for my interviews with Messrs. Blackstone, Coke upon Lyttelton, and other legal luminaries. Accordingly, on the day in question, after having nearly quarrelled with my mother for congratulating me warmly on the attainment of my wishes, when I mentioned to her Lawless's proposal, found fault with Fanny's Italian pronunciation so harshly as to bring tears into her eyes, and grievously offended our old female domestic by disdainfully rejecting some pet abomination upon which she had decreed that I should lunch, I sallied forth, and, not wishing to encounter any of the family, entered the hall by a side door, and reached the library unobserved. To my surprise I discovered Lawless (whom I did not recollect ever to have seen there before, he being not much given to literary pursuits) seated, pen in hand, at the table, apparently absorbed in the mysteries of composition.
“I shall not disturb you, Lawless,” said I, taking down a book. “I am only going to read law for an hour or two.”
“Eh! disturb me?” was the reply; “I'm uncommon glad to be disturbed, I can tell you, for hang me if I can make head or tail of it! Here have I been for the last three hours trying to write an offer to your sister, and actually have not contrived to make a fair start of it yet. I wish you would lend me a hand, there's a good fellow—I know you are up to all the right dodges—just give one a sort of notion, eh? don't you see?”
“What! write an offer to my own sister? Well, of all the quaint ideas I ever heard, that's the oddest—really you must excuse me.”
“Very odd, is it?” inquired Coleman, opening the door in time to overhear the last sentence. “Pray let me hear about it, then, for I like to know of odd things particularly; but, perhaps, I'm intruding?”
“Eh? no; come along here, Coleman,” cried Lawless, “you are just the very boy I want—I am going to be married—that is, I want to be, don't you see, if she'll have me, but there's the rub; Frank Fairlegh is all right, and the old lady says she's agreeable, so everything depends on the young woman herself—if she will but say 'Yes,' we shall go ahead in style; but, unfortunately before she is likely to say anything one way or the other, you understand, I've got to pop the question, as they call it. Now, I've about as much notion of making an offer as a cow has of dancing a hornpipe—so I want you to help us a bit—eh?”