“Yes, to be sure,” replied Oaklands; “I'll go on, for I am anxious to speak to my father. Freddy, old boy! shake hands; I'm the happiest fellow in existence!” so saying, he seized and wrung Coleman's hand with a heartiness which elicited sundry grotesque contortions, indicative of agony, from that individual, and, bounding forward, was soon lost to sight in the deepening twilight.
“And so, you see,” continued I, after having imparted to Coleman as much as I considered necessary of the state of affairs, a confidence which he received with mingled exclamations of surprise and delight—“and so, you see, we've not only got to tell Lawless that he is refused, poor fellow I but that Fanny has accepted Oaklands; very awkward, isn't it?”
“It would be with anybody else,” replied Coleman; “but I think there are ways and means of managing the thing which will prevent any very desperate consequences in the present instance; sundry ideas occur to me; would you mind my being in the room when you tell him?”
“As far as I am concerned, I should be only too glad to have you,” returned I, “if you do not think it would annoy him.”
“I'm not afraid of that,” was the rejoinder; “as I wrote the offer for him, it strikes me I'm the very person he ought to select for his confidant.”
“Do you think,” he added, after a moment's thought, “Harry would sell those phaeton horses?”
“That's the line of argument you intend to bring forward by way of consolation, is it? Well, it is not such a bad notion,” replied I; “but don't be too sure of success, 'Equo ne crédite Tueri': I doubt its being in the power of horse-flesh to carry such a weight of disappointment as I fear this news will occasion him.”
“Well, I've other schemes to fall back upon if this should fail,” returned Freddy; “and now let us get on, for the sooner we put him out of his misery the better.”
“Where's the master?” inquired I, encountering Shrimp as we crossed the hall.
“He's upstairs, sir; in his own room, sir; a-going it like bricks, if you please, sir; you can hear him down here, Gents.”