“But you’re not ambitious.”
“Very little; but I should be sorry to be out of the tideway.”
“I call it a system of slaughter,” said the colonel; and Mr. Austin said, “The world goes in that way—love and slaughter.”
“Not suicide though,” Colonel Halkett muttered.
“No, that’s only incidental.”
The casual word “love” led Colonel Halkett to speak to Cecilia of an old love-affair of Seymour Austin’s, in discussing the state of his health with her. The lady was the daughter of a famous admiral, handsome, and latterly of light fame. Mr. Austin had nothing to regret in her having married a man richer than himself.
“I wish he had married a good woman,” said the colonel.
“He looks unwell, papa.”
“He thinks you’re looking unwell, my dear.”
“He thinks that of me?”