“Ah, Augusta, how happy we shall all be here together,” said Mary, “for of course you will dispose of your English estates, and live here with us. This house is large enough for half a dozen families.”
“Are you not looking too hastily into the future, my friend?” said Lady Vale, coldly. “Victoria has more than myself to consult. She is not yet eighteen. Her guardian’s consent is needed. She is much too young to think of marrying. Sir William Pelham will at least think so, I am sure. He has full control of her until her eighteenth birthday. I can do nothing.” She did not add that she would lose no time in penning a letter to Sir William, enjoining him in strictest confidence to withhold his consent to this to her distasteful marriage. Her speech was like a cold-water douche to her hearers.
“How soon will she become eighteen?” asked Roger.
“Next December.”
“Then will she be free to do as she chooses?”
“She does not come into her dower until she is twenty-one,” replied Lady Vale, evasively.
“But she can marry at the age of eighteen?” persisted Roger.
“No doubt she can,” returned Lady Vale, “but girls at that age are fickle. She may have changed her mind by then.”
Mary looked sadly at her friend. She saw that Lady Vale was far from pleased at Victoria’s choice, and as she thought of it she could hardly blame her. If she had been blessed with a lovely high-born daughter, would she willingly have consented to her wedding a comparative nobody; moreover one so afflicted as Roger? She laid her hand on Lady Vale’s shoulder. “Dear Augusta, let the children settle this matter between them. If Victoria repents of her choice; if she wishes at any time to be released, Roger will immediately give her her freedom. Is it not so, my son?”
“Most assuredly so, mother. I have no wish but for Victoria’s complete happiness. She shall not be bound by any promise, except by her own sweet will. I am human enough to be selfish, and to crave her love and care, but I am not so selfish that I will not seek her happiness before my own.”