“Well, then, what?” interrupted Mr. Thornton, impatient to hear the rest.
“Mildred will receive his letter to-morrow night,” said Geraldine, “and as it is Saturday, she cannot answer until Monday, of course. In the meantime you must go to see her——”
“Me!” exclaimed Mr. Thornton. “I go to Beechwood to rouse up that old lion! It’s as much as my life is worth. You don’t know him, Geraldine. He has the most violent temper, and I do not wish to make him angry with me just at present.”
“Perhaps you won’t see him,” returned Geraldine. “Lilian says he frequently takes a ride on horseback about sunset, as he thinks it keeps off the apoplexy, and he may be gone. At all events, you can ask to see Miss Howell alone. You must tell Lawrence you are going to Albany, and that will account for your taking the early train. You will thus reach Mayfield at the same time with the letter, but can stop at the hotel until it has been received and read.”
“I begin to get your meaning,” said Mr. Thornton, brightening up. “You wish me to see her before she has had time to answer it, and to give her some very weighty reason why she should refuse my son. I can do that, too. But will she listen? She is as fiery as a pepper-pod herself.”
“Perhaps not at first, but I think her high temper and foolish pride will materially aid you, particularly when you touch upon her parentage, and hint that you will be ashamed of her—besides, you are to take from me a letter in which I shall appeal to her sympathy for Lilian, and that will go a great ways with her, for I do believe she loves Lilian.”
A while longer they talked together, and Geraldine had thoroughly succeeded in making Mr. Thornton understand what he was to do, when Lawrence himself came to the door, knocking for admittance. He seemed a little surprised at finding Geraldine there, but her well-timed remark to his father, “So you think I’d better try Bridget a week or two longer?” convinced him that there was some trouble with the servants, a thing not of rare occurrence in their household.
Mr. Thornton looked up quickly, not quite comprehending her, but she was gone ere he had time to ask her what she meant, and he was alone with his son. Lawrence had come to tell his father everything, but his father did not wish to be told. He was not such an adept in cunning as Geraldine, and he feared lest he might betray himself either by word or manner, so he talked of indifferent subjects, asking Lawrence about the accident,—and Beechwood, and about Judge Howell, and finally coming to business, where he managed to drag in rather bunglingly, that he was going to Albany in the morning, and should not return till Monday.
“I can tell him then,” thought Lawrence, “and if she should refuse me, it would be as well for him not to know it.”
Thus deciding, he bade his father good-night, and when next morning at a rather late hour he came down to breakfast, he was told by the smiling Geraldine that “Uncle Robert had started on the mail train for Albany.”