"Engaged?" The rector looked startled for an instant. Then he recovered himself. "You have reference, I presume, to that Puritan psalm-singer, John Whitney. Oh, I'll engage to cure the pretty child of him! She is coy with me now; excuses herself when I call, has vapors when her mother insists; refuses to permit me to salute her hand. But I have no fear, Sir Charles. Consider my position. I shall get her, have no fear."
"Still, I have observed that she attends your rival's church," remarked Sir Charles, maliciously.
The rector emptied a glass. "If you'd but help me there," he said.
"I help you! Damme, what can I do, George?"
"Since Benedict Calvert left the city 'tis Mistress Virginia, your future wife, who takes her sister to the Puritan meetings. Now, Fairfield, if you—if you would be so monstrous obliging as to speak a word to your young lady in—ah—my favor, I'd be forever beholden to you."
Sir Charles laughed unpleasantly. "Lord, Master Rockwell, d' ye think I'm married yet? What possible right have I to address my cousin on any subject but—the one I most avoid with her?"
"The one you most avoid? And what, pray, is that?"
"The tender matter of love, George. Love and Virginia are—well—strangers in my heart."
"Good Heavens! Are you not, then, to wed the lady?"
"Damme, my good fellow, I don't know! I would to Heaven I did know—the state of another person's affections."