"Tell us," said Granger this evening, as he--clad in a brand-new suit, a new wig, and clean fresh lace--sat at the Beau's table, "us all. Let us know what is to be. My friends," he said, addressing two or three dissolute-looking young men, all fashionably dressed, who also sat, or rather lolled, at the repast, "we have a task, the task of duty, of friendship, to perform to-morrow early. Tell us, or rather tell them, since I know very well, what is to be done."
"Well, brave boys," exclaimed the Beau, beaming on them, as who would not beam who upon the morrow was to marry a hundred thousand guineas, "this is the plan: We wed to-morrow at Keith's Chapel, in May Fair, at eleven. I would that it had been earlier, but Keith's clerk says his reverence's deputy--Keith being now in Newgate--is never to be depended on before that hour, he not having slept off the effects of--well! of over-night."
"Keith's Chapel!" exclaimed one of the guests, who himself appeared as though he would not have slept off the effects of the present night much before the hour that had been mentioned. "Why, I protest, 'twas there James, Duke of Hamilton, married Miss Gunning a few years ago. You will be in the fashion, Beau."
"Ay! 'tis so," exclaimed Granger. "We are nothing if not fashionable."
"Yet," said an older, graver man than the first speaker, "are you very sure that thus you will be by law united? Has not a Marriage Act passed forbidding such things?"
"Such an Act has passed," Bufton replied, "but there are doubts as to its being able to break the holy tie, Keith being a licensed clergyman still permitted by the Archbishop to issue the license on a crown stamp, and to give a certificate. But even were it not so," and now Beau Bufton bestowed that smile of his upon his guests which always caused Granger's gall to rise, "the ceremony may serve, illegal though it should be; for if it is so, at least it will have given me sufficient possession of my young heiress to make another and more binding one necessary; while who, do you imagine, would be willing to marry my adorable Ariadne Thorne afterwards? In truth, she could belong to none but me."
"Ariadne Thorne!" exclaimed the youngest member of the company present, who now spoke for the first time during the present conversation, and causing his exclamation to be heard above the shrill peal of nervous laughter emitted by Lewis Granger at the Beau's exposition. "Ariadne Thorne! Can there be two of that name?"
"I devoutly hope not," remarked the Beau, fingering his chin and looking himself a little nervous, the company thought, "or else I have caged the wrong bird. What Ariadne Thorne do you know of, then, Dallas?"
"One who is a rich heiress, even as you say your future bride is. One who is the owner of Fanshawe Manor, in Hampshire, and is beloved by Sir Geoffrey Barry."
"'Tis she!" Bufton said, with his most hateful chuckle. "'Tis she. And Dallas, my dear, I have won her from him. She never loved him, and she is mine."