“‘What!’ cries Mr Vining, ‘is she ill? Let me—let me see her—only once—for a minute, dear Mrs Brandon! Pray—on my knees I beg it of you! You cannot be so cruel, so hardhearted, as to refuse!’ And then I heard a loud sobbing wail as of a woman crying, and—There, I’m blest if I go on, if you will keep on snivelling. Why, blame the women, you’re both on you at it!”
“We—we—we—we—we’re—only a-blowin’ our noses,” sobbed the housemaid.
“Never see such noses!” growled Edward, who then continued:
“Well, directly after, as if in a passion, Mr Vining says:
“‘Mrs Brandon, this is cruel and harsh. I left you last week with my hopes raised; to-day you dash them to the ground.’
“‘Mr Vining—Mr Vining!’ she says softly.
“‘I tell you this,’ he says, shouting again; and hearing his words, you could almost see him stamping up and down the breakfast-room—‘I tell you this. Mrs Brandon: the ties of duty are strong, but the ties formed by the heart of a man newly-awakened to love are stronger. To win Ella Bedford, my own love, I will give all—time, hope, everything; I will leave no stone unturned—I will stop at nothing! I see that she has been coerced—that she has been, as it were, cruelly stolen from me by external pressure; and it shall be my task to win her back. I had hoped to have had you on my side; as it is, I must begin my battle by myself. I thank you for your patient hearing of my words; but before I go I tell you this—that till I learn that, by her own act, she gives herself to another, I will never cease from my pursuit.’
“The next minute he was in the hall, and I handed him his hat, brushed as he never had it brushed before; when, even then, upset as he was, he puts his hand in his pocket, and pushed something into my fist.
“‘Sixpence,’ I says to myself, as I shut the door after him, and him a-walking away like mad.”
“Sixpence!” echoed the cook.