“And I explained how n-nothing would induce Charlotte to m-marry him, and he did not seem to m-mind that.”
“I shall die,” said Charlotte with resolution, “of Mortification!”
“Oh, Horry dear!” sighed Elizabeth, between tears and laughter.
“And I asked him,” concluded Horatia triumphantly, “if, he would marry m-me instead. And he is g-going to!”
Her relatives were bereft of speech. Even Lady Winwood apparently considered that the situation had gone beyond the powers of her vinaigrette to mend, for she allowed it to slip from her hand to the floor while she stared in a bemused way at her youngest-born.
It was Charlotte who found her voice first. “Horatia, do you say that you had the Indelicacy, the Impropriety, the—the Forwardness, to ask Lord Rule to marry you?”
“Yes,” said Horatia staunchly. “I had to.”
“And—and—” Charlotte groped for words—“he consented to—to marry you in place of Lizzie?”
Horatia nodded.
“He cannot,” said Charlotte, “have noticed the Stammer.”