“Oh, Mr Trethick! I’m so glad,” cried Madge; but her uncle made as if to throw something at her, and she ran out of the room, while Geoffrey hastily re-read the letter.
“Do you see that?” cried the old gentleman. “You’ve been talking nonsense to her, and you promised not.”
“I? no! Hang the girl!” cried Geoffrey, joyously. “Uncle Paul, old man, the tree’s going to bear fruit at last?”
Chapter Twenty One.
The Vicar is Shocked.
Geoffrey read it that he was to go up to. An Morlock, where he was informed that Mr Penwynn was engaged, but would be at liberty in a few minutes, and he was shown into the drawing-room, where he found the young vicar and Rhoda, who rose eagerly, but the next moment seemed rather constrained.
“The vicar has been discoursing of spiritual love,” said Geoffrey to himself, as he declined to notice, either Rhoda’s constraint or the young clergyman’s stiffness, but chatted away in his free-and-easy manner.
“By the way, Miss Penwynn,” he said, after a few moments’ conversation, during which he felt that he was in the way, “I saw you were at church last Sunday.”