A slight, unmistakable shudder ran through the Corinthian. “My children about me ... Yes. Precisely, ma’am. Pray continue!”
“You owe it to the name,” pursued his mother. “You are the last of the Wyndhams, for it’s not to be supposed that your Uncle Lucius will marry at this late date. There is Melissa, dear girl, the very wife for you! So handsome, so distinguished—birth, breeding: everything of the most desirable!”
“Ah—your pardon, ma’am, but do you include Saar, and Cedric, not to mention Beverley, under that heading?”
“That’s exactly what I say!” broke in George. “ “It’s all very well,” I said, “and if a man likes to marry an iceberg it’s all one to me, but you can’t call Saar a desirable father-in-law, damme if you can! While as for the girl’s precious brothers,” I said, “they’ll ruin Richard inside a year!”“
“Nonsense!” said Louisa. “It is understood, of course, that Richard would make handsome settlements. But as for his being responsible for Cedric’s and Beverley’s debts, I’m sure I know of no reason why he should!”
“You comfort me, Louisa,” said Sir Richard.
She looked up at him not unaffectionately. “Well, I think it is time to be frank, Richard. People will be saying next that you are playing fast and loose with Melissa, for you must know the understanding between you is an open secret. If you had chosen to marry someone else, five, ten years ago, it would have been a different thing. But so far as I am aware your affections have never even been engaged, and here you are, close on thirty, as good as pledged to Melissa Brandon, and nothing settled!”
Lady Wyndham, though in the fullest agreement with her daughter, was moved at this point to defend her son, which she did by reminding Louisa that Richard was only twenty-nine after all.
“Mama, Richard will be thirty in less than six months. For I,” said Louisa with resolution, “am turned thirty-one.”
“Louisa, I am touched!” said Sir Richard. “Only the deepest sisterly devotion, I am persuaded, could have wrung from you such an admission.”