"I think you need not hesitate to tell me," the captain said, with a look of surprise. "I feel very sure you would not ask anything wrong or unreasonable."
"No; my request is neither, I think. It is that I may, if I can, win the heart and hand of your daughter Grace."
"Surely, surely you must acknowledge that that is unreasonable!" exclaimed the captain, in a tone of astonishment not unmixed with indignation. "Such a mixture of relationships—making you your sister's son-in-law, and my daughter my sister-in-law!"
"My mother's idea is that we might keep to our own relationships as they are now; and she thinks as there is absolutely no tie of blood between us there could be nothing wrong in such a marriage."
"No, perhaps not absolutely wrong, but very distasteful to me. Besides, as you yourself must acknowledge, Grace is entirely too young to marry."
"But all the time growing older, as well as more and more beautiful, and I can wait. She is worth waiting for as long as Jacob served for Rachel. And would it not be wise to give her to a physician, who will make her health his constant care?"
"Perhaps so," returned the captain, with a rather perplexed and sad sort of smile; "and if you have won her heart and are willing to wait till she is of suitable age, I—don't forbid you to tell her—how dearly you love her—if you can."
"A thousand thanks, Brother Levis!" exclaimed Harold, seizing the captain's hand in a vise-like grasp, and giving it a hearty shake.
"I don't know how to put my love into words—it seems to me they would be powerless to express it—but I shall try and hope to win a return by untiring devotion."
"She has a loving heart, and her father finds it hard to be called upon to resign the first place in it," the captain said, with an involuntary sigh.