In fact Mr. Torrens was deeply anxious to learn the result of the bold venture which Mrs. Slingsby was that morning to make. With him it was now a matter of pecuniary ruin or salvation; and he had overcome so many difficulties already,—stifling his own scruples at taking an immodest woman for his wife, and reducing his daughter to a belief in the necessity of his submitting to this matrimonial arrangement,—that he trembled lest some unforeseen accident should thwart him just at the moment when he appeared to be touching on the goal of success. Moreover, he had that morning, ere quitting home, so contrived matters with John Jeffreys as to induce this man to leave his service without delay; and he had enjoyed the supreme satisfaction of seeing that dangerous person leave his house ere he himself had set out to keep his appointment with Mrs. Slingsby. Thus every thing had progressed in accordance with Mr. Torrens' views and wishes, so far as the preliminaries to his change of condition were involved.
"Well, my dear madam, what tidings?" he eagerly demanded, as he approached to meet Mrs. Slingsby.
"I have succeeded," she said, throwing herself into a chair. "But I would not for worlds undergo again the same dreadful alternations between acute suspense and thrilling joy—cold tremor and feverish excitement."
"And yet the transaction has given a charming glow of animation to your countenance," observed Mr. Torrens, now for the first time inflamed by desire in respect to the amorous widow whom he was shortly to make his wife. "I have procured the license; and——"
"And Rosamond—what of her?" demanded Mrs. Slingsby hastily.
"She will receive you with a respectful welcome at Torrens Cottage," was the answer. "By dint of reasoning with her, I overcame all her scruples, and rendered her pliant and ductile to our purposes."
"All progresses well, then," said Mrs. Slingsby. "Let us now away to Mr. Howard."
And to that gentleman's office did the pair proceed. Their business was soon explained to the attorney, who manifested no surprise nor any particular emotion at the singularity of the transaction; for Mr. Howard was a perfect man of business, ready to receive instructions without expressing any feelings at all calculated to annoy his clients, and never indicating a curiosity to learn more than those clients might choose to confide to him.
"I am to keep this sum of two thousand pounds until such time as Mr. Torrens may claim it in the capacity of your husband?" he said, as coolly and quietly as if he were receiving a deposit on the purchase of an estate.
"Exactly so," answered Mrs. Slingsby.