Lord Miller found that he had recovered his lovely child only to lose her again.
St. George was the most persistent lover in the world.
He pleaded continually for an early marriage.
“Floy is nothing but a child, barely seventeen. Wait till her eighteenth birthday,” answered the fond father.
The lover was most unhappy over the year’s probation.
“I can not bear to lose sight of my darling again. I give you warning I shall follow you to England when you take her away—ay, to the world’s end!” he protested.
Lord Miller answered, laughingly:
“I shall extend you a cordial invitation to be our guest at our English home for as long as you please,” and with that the lover had to be content, for even his own parents, though they loved Floy so dearly, took part against him.
“It is right that her father should have her for a time,” they said; and Floy, who adored her noble parent, was well satisfied to have it so. She knew quite well, the saucy little darling, that St. George would seldom be absent from her side in that year of waiting.
They would not sail for their ancestral home until October, anyway, for they had much to do in America.