“I recollect the young lady; the greatest objection I should raise to her, is a want of personal attractions. Of all Mrs. Bradfort's acquaintances, I think she was among the very plainest.”
“What is beauty, Miles? In marriage, very different recommendations are to be looked for by the husband.”
“Yet, I have understood you practised on another theory; Mrs. Hardinge, even as I recollect her, was very handsome.”
“Yes, that is true,” answered the good divine, simply; “she was so; but beauty is not to be considered as an objection. If you do not relish the idea of Kate Hervey, what do you say to Jane Harwood—there is a pretty girl for you.”
“A pretty girl, sir, but not for me. But, in naming so many young ladies, why do you overlook your own daughter?”
I said this with a sort of desperate resolution, tempted by the opportunity, and the direction the discourse had taken. When it was uttered, I repented of my temerity, and almost trembled to hear the answer.
“Lucy!” exclaimed Mr. Hardinge, turning suddenly to towards me, and looking so intently and earnestly in my face, that I saw the possibility of such a thing then struck him, for the first time. “Sure enough, why should you not marry Lucy? There is not a particle of relationship between you, after all, though I have so long considered you as brother and sister. I wish we had thought of this earlier, Miles; it would be a most capital connection—though I should insist on your quitting the sea. Lucy has too affectionate a heart, to be always in distress for an absent husband. I wonder the possibility of this thing did not strike me, before it was too late; in a man so much accustomed to see what is going on around me, to overlook this!”
The words “too late,” sounded to me like the doom of fate; and had my simple-minded companion but the tithe of the observation which he so much vaunted, he must have seen my agitation. I had advanced so far, however, that I determined to learn the worst, whatever pain it might cost me.
“I suppose, sir the very circumstance that we were brought up together has prevented us all from regarding the thing as possible. But, why 'too late,' my excellent guardian, if we who are the most interested in the thing should happen to think otherwise?”
“Certainly not too late, if you include Lucy, herself, in your conditions; but I am afraid, Miles, it is 'too late' for Lucy.”