"It shall be done," returned Mr. Torrens. "The ceremony will be performed here?" he added interrogatively.
"Yes—at seven o'clock in the evening. I will make arrangements with two ladies whom I know, to be bridesmaids, and Dr. Wagtail will give me away. After the ceremony we will repair to Torrens Cottage."
Thus, calmly and deliberately, was settled the solemn covenant between the man who had sold his daughter's virtue and the licentious woman who was now prepared to commit a forgery!
And the worthy pair separated, Mr. Torrens having embraced his intended wife, because he considered a kiss to be as it were the seal of the bargain just concluded, and also because Mrs. Slingsby by her manner appeared to invite the salutation.
CHAPTER LXXXI.
ROSAMOND AT HOME.
We shall follow Mr. Torrens homeward, and see how he acquitted himself of the disagreeable and difficult task of breaking his matrimonial intentions to his daughter, the fair but ruined Rosamond.
It was past nine o'clock in the evening when he reached the cottage; and Rosamond, with a charming filial solicitude to render her parent's home as comfortable as possible, had superintended the preparations for supper. Exercising a command, too, over the sad feelings which filled her bosom, and invoking resignation with Christian fortitude to her aid, she even manifested a species of cheerfulness as she opened the front-door at the sound of his well-known knock. But, alas! it was not the innocent—artless cheerfulness of other days:—it was merely the struggle of the moonbeam to pierce the mass of dark and menacing clouds!
And now behold the father and daughter seated at the supper-table—that repast which the care of Rosamond had endeavoured to render as agreeable as possible, but which was disposed of hastily and without appetite on either side.
At length, when the things were cleared away and Mr. Torrens had fortified his courage with sundry glasses of wine, he prepared to enter on the grave and important subject which occupied his mind.
"Rosamond, my love," he said, speaking in as kind a tone as it was possible for his nature to assume, "I have something to communicate to you, and shall be glad if you will hear me calmly and without excitement. I have this evening seen Mrs. Slingsby."