He tried persuasion, he tried anger; and no impression whatever could he make on Robert Dalrymple. He thought Robert was wilfully, wickedly obstinate; the secret truth being that Robert was ruined. Oscar told him he "washed his hands" of him, and departed.
It chanced that same afternoon that Robert was passing through Grosvenor Square and met Mr. Grubb close to his house. Looking at him casually, reader, he has not changed; he has the same noble presence, the same gracious manner; nevertheless, the fifteen or sixteen months that have elapsed since his marriage, have brought a look of care to his refined and thoughtful face, a line of pain to his brow. They shook hands.
"Will you come in, Robert?"
"I don't mind if I do," was the answer—for in good truth Robert Dalrymple was too wretched not to seize on anything that might serve to divert him from his own thoughts. But Mr. Grubb paused in sudden remembrance.
"Mary is here today. Have you any objection to meet her?"
"Objection! I shall like it," answered Robert, with a flush of emotion, for Mary Lynn was still inexpressibly dear to him. "I wish with my whole heart that she was my wife—that we had never parted! It was all my foolish doing."
"I thought at the time you were rather chivalrous: I must say that," observed Mr. Grubb, regarding him attentively. "I suppose, in point of fact, you are both waiting for one another now."
"Why do you say that?" asked the young man, in evident agitation.
"Step in here, Robert," said Mr. Grubb, drawing him through the hall to his own room, the library. "Mary persistently refuses to accept good offers: she has had two during the past year; therefore, I conclude that she and you have some private understanding upon the point. I told her so one day, and all the answer I received consisted of a laugh and a blush."
It could have been nothing to the blush that rose to Robert's face now; brow, ears, neck, all were dyed blood-red. The terrible consciousness of how untrue this was, how untrue it was obliged to be, was smiting him with reproachful sting. Mr. Grubb mistook the signs.