'And has Clare had no offers since my time?' asked Trevor Chute, almost timidly.
'Two; good ones, also.'
'And she refused them?'
'So Ida told me.'
'Ida again; you and Mrs. Beverley seem very good friends.'
'Yes, though she used me shockingly in throwing me over for Beverley.'
'And why did—Clare refuse?'
'Can't say, for the life of me; women are such enigmas; unless a certain Trevor Chute, then broiling in the Punjaub, wherever that may be, had something to do with it.'
'I can pardon much in you, Jerry Vane,' said Chute, gravely; 'for we have been staunch friends ever since I was a species of big brother to you at Rugby; but please not to make a jest of Clare and me. And what of pretty Violet?'
'Oh, Violet is all right,' replied Vane, speaking very fast, and reddening a little at his friend's reproach. 'She has those graceful, taking, and pretty ways with her and about her that will be sure to do well for her in the end; thus, sooner or later, Violet's fortune is certain to be made in a matrimonial point of view.'