“I thought you had some motive in the matter besides love to me. But I’d pay it if she’d marry me. But she won’t.”
“She will, if you choose to be a little bolder. We leave here, my wife, Neva and myself, next Monday for Wynde Heights. Mrs. Black will use all her influence with Neva during our absence to induce her to accept you, and I am sure she will succeed. You are to hold yourself in readiness to come to us at any moment on receiving my summons.”
“Where is Wynde Heights?”
“In Yorkshire.”
“Very well. I will come when you notify me. But I don’t think going will do any good. Miss Wynde is no coquette, and not likely to change her mind. Besides, she is likely to marry Lord Towyn.”
“I think not,” said Craven Black significantly. “She is a minor, and I don’t believe she would marry against the wishes of her step-mother?”
“The question is if your wife is her step-mother,” remarked Rufus, still recklessly. “The probability is that the relationship is worn out by this time, and the sense of duty that Miss Wynde may have felt toward her father’s widow will fall short when it comes to be directed toward Craven Black’s wife.”
“We won’t go into details,” said his father coolly. “If you want to marry the girl, keep telling her so. There’s nothing like persistence.”
“Ye-s; but about that ten thousand pounds a year?” said Rufus thoughtfully. “I don’t think it would be right to take any such sum out of her income, and besides, it might be impossible.”
“Leave that to me. As to the right and wrong of it, a perjurer is not qualified to judge. Confine yourself to what you can understand. It is time to get ready for dinner, and I advise you to come down with a cheerful face.”