"I care for her very much, mother; and I haven't owned to being absolutely in love with our pretty little May. Perhaps I care for one as much as the other; perhaps I know in my inmost heart she is the one I should marry. That is, if she will marry me."
"You owe it to her to ask her."
"Do I? Very likely; and it would make you happy, my mother?"
He came and bent over her again, smiling down in her wan, anxious face.
"More happy than anything else in this world, Rupert."
"Then consider it an accomplished fact. Before the sun sets to-day Aileen Jocyln shall say yes or no to your son."
He bent and kissed her; then, without waiting for her to speak, wheeled round and strode out of the apartment.
"There is nothing like striking while the iron is hot," said the young man to himself with a grim sort of smile as he ran down stairs; "for good or for evil, there is no time like the present, my stately Aileen."
Loitering on the lawn, he encountered May Everard, still in her riding-habit, surrounded by three or four poodle dogs.
"On the wing again, Rupert? Is it for mamma? She is not worse?"