"No; it is only prudent. I told you I wanted to see my daughter happily married before I die. Well, when I was in London the other day I saw a specialist—at the advice of Ringston, here—and he told me my life is not quite so good as I thought."
"Oh, sir, I hope he was wrong."
"So do I, Hector. But I shall act as if I was sure he was right. There is nothing certain about his verdict—a man and a mortal disease may jog on for years together—so not a word to alarm Grace. I would not have the bright morning of her life clouded by fears about me. You can tell her that I admire your character so much that I want to secure you at once as my son-in-law. I shall only tell her to set about her trousseau."
Grace required a great deal of talking to, on her father's part and on Hector's, before she was reconciled to a speedy marriage. She was sure her father wanted her. He had not been looking well lately. He had left off those early morning rides which had been so delightful, and which she had often shared with him—those long scampers on the broad margins of greensward on the edge of the pine-woods, in the freshness of the new day. He let his groom drive for him, even his favourite cob, whose mouth no hand but his own had been allowed to control till lately.
Her father laughed off her fears.
"Did you think I was never going to be an old man, Gracie?"
"Not yet, father! Oh, not yet for a score of years. Why, it was only last summer everybody was telling me how young you looked—growing younger instead of older."
"That was last summer, Gracie. Où sont les neiges d'antan? Don't you know that when Time has seemed to stand still for ever so long, he seems to move on very fast all of a sudden? It is all only seeming. The sands are always falling, and the scythe is always moving—slow and sure, my love, slow and very sure. But I shall be a happy old man when I see my darling married to the man of her choice."
"If you call yourself an old man, I won't marry him," Grace said almost angrily. "If you are an old man, you want a spinster daughter to take care of you—and in that case I shall never marry."
He smiled at her with a touch of mournfulness. She would not have long to wait, perhaps, if she insisted on staying to the end.