There was a point, for a moment, in the look he returned on this, while he said to himself that if necessary he would transmit his appeal through the old lady at Roehampton. “All right—good-bye. You know what I want at any rate.” Then as he was going he turned and added: “You needn’t be afraid I won’t always bring her over in the hot weather!”
“In the hot weather?” Lady Canterville murmured with vague visions of the torrid zone. Jackson however quitted the house with the sense he had made great concessions.
His host and hostess passed into a small morning-room and—Lord Canterville having taken up his hat and stick to go out again—stood there a moment, face to face. Then his lordship spoke in a summary manner. “It’s clear enough he wants her.”
“There’s something so odd about him,” Lady Canterville answered. “Fancy his speaking so about settlements!”
“You had better give him his head. He’ll go much quieter.”
“He’s so obstinate—very obstinate; it’s easy to see that. And he seems to think,” she went on, “that a girl in your daughter’s position can be married from one day to the other—with a ring and a new frock—like a housemaid.”
“Well that, of course, over there is the kind of thing. But he seems really to have a most extraordinary fortune, and every one does say they give their women carte blanche.”
“Carte blanche is not what Barb wants; she wants a settlement. She wants a definite income,” said Lady Canterville; “she wants to be safe.”
He looked at her rather straight. “Has she told you so? I thought you said—” And then he stopped. “I beg your pardon,” he added.
She didn’t explain her inconsequence; she only remarked that American fortunes were notoriously insecure; one heard of nothing else; they melted away like smoke. It was their own duty to their child to demand that something should be fixed.