“For God’s sake, talk sense, Overshaw! What is the plain English for all this?”
“Listen: your son Ponsonby has seduced this man’s daughter—which is bad enough. But the girl is only fifteen—the which is a felony.”
The old lord burst into a storm of oaths:
“Damn it, Overshaw; don’t I tell you I was for ever drumming it into the lad’s ears that there were enough married women of his own class in the county for any sane man’s pleasure—and he has descended to my coachman’s wenches! It’s the filthy vulgarity of the fellow——”
He stopped—his bloodshot eyes catching the sneer upon the old lawyer’s lips:
“What d’ye say?” he bawled.
The lawyer put his hand on the arm of the other:
“Lord Wyntwarde, you do not understand—the girl is fifteen—this is a common felony—if the young fellow does not marry the girl, he may have to go to gaol—to the common gaol——”
“I am not his keeper—curse him!”
“No,” said the old lawyer drily—“but do you want the criminal law to usurp your duties?... There is a child coming. Even if this youth put aside common honour, common justice, as he has done before, it cannot now save him. All depends on how you treat the girl’s father.”