“Would you please loose my hand?” went on Emma. “The lace has caught in your sleeve-button.”
“I’ll undo it,” said Tom. “What pretty lace it is! Is it Valenciennes? My mother thinks there’s no lace like Valenciennes.”
“It is only pillow,” replied Emma, bending her face over the lace and the buttons. “After you left this morning, papa said he wished he had remembered to ask you where he could get a prospectus of those water-works. He——”
“Mrs. and Miss Maceveril,” interrupted a servant, opening the door to show in some ladies.
So the interview was over; and Tom took the opportunity to go to the lawyer’s dining-room, and tell him about the water-works.
“You have come over from Crabb to go to this fine concert!” cried Mr. Paul, sipping his port wine; which he always took out of a claret-glass. Though never more than one glass, he would be half-an-hour over it.
“I have come to say I can’t go to it,” replied Tom. “My mother thinks it would not be seemly so soon after Uncle Jacob’s death.”
“Quite right of her, too. Why don’t you sit down? No wine? Well, sit down all the same. I want to talk to you. Will you come into my office?”
The proposal was so sudden, so unexpected, that Tom scarcely knew what to make of it. He did not know that Mr. Paul’s office wanted him.