"But do you mean to say that you could not love him?"
"No, I do not; and I will do all I can, Peter—I will try. I never will, if possible, make him unhappy who has been so kind to you."
"Depend upon it, Ellen, that with your knowledge of O'Brien, and with feelings of gratitude to him, you will soon love him, if once you accept him as a suitor. May I tell him—"
"You may tell him that he may plead his own cause, my dear brother; and, at all events, I will listen to no other until he has had fair play; but recollect that at present I only like him—like him very much, it is true; but still I only like him."
I was quite satisfied with my success, and so was O'Brien, when I told him. "By the powers, Peter, she's an angel, and I can't expect her to love an inferior being like myself; but if she'll only like me well enough to marry me, I'll trust to after-marriage for the rest. Love comes with the children, Peter. Well, but you need not say that to her— divil a bit—they shall come upon her like old age, without her perceiving it."
O'Brien having thus obtained permission, certainly lost no time in taking advantage of it. Celeste and I were more fondly attached every day. The solicitor declared my case so good, that he could raise fifty thousand pounds upon it. In short, all our causes were prosperous, when an event occurred, the details of which, of course, I did not obtain until some time afterwards, but which I shall narrate here.
My uncle was very much alarmed when he discovered that I had been released from Bedlam—still more so, when he had notice given him of a suit, relative to the succession to the title. His emissaries had discovered that the wet-nurse had been brought home in O'Brien's frigate, and was kept so close that they could not communicate with her. He now felt that all his schemes would prove abortive. His legal adviser was with him, and they had been walking in the garden, talking over the contingencies, when they stopped close to the drawing-room windows of the mansion at Eagle Park.
"But, sir," observed the lawyer, "if you will not confide in me, I cannot act for your benefit. You still assert that nothing of the kind has taken place?"
"I do," replied his lordship. "It is a foul invention."
"Then, my lord, may I ask you why you considered it advisable to imprison Mr Simple in Bedlam?"