"Lord Osborne has promised to give me a new carriage when either he or I marry," said Mr. Howard; "and I mean to make mine serve till that event."
"And are you come wooing now in person or as proxy?" whispered Tom, quite loud enough for Emma to hear. "A good place this—one need not ask twice, I fancy."
"Mr. Musgrove," said Howard in his particularly quiet but decisive way, "you are as welcome to laugh at my carriage as you should be to use it, if it were necessary; but remember there are subjects on which jesting is indelicate, and places where it is insulting." He turned away as he spoke and addressed Mr. Watson, to give Emma's cheeks time to recover from the glow which betrayed that she had heard more than was pleasant.
Tom looked a little foolish, and after a moment's hesitation, addressed an enquiry to Emma as to whether she had been walking that forenoon. He only gained a mono-syllable in reply, and then Emma drawing little Charles towards her, began a confidential conversation with him on the subject of his garden and companions at school, and the comparative merits of base-ball and cricket. Tom was repulsed, so turning to Elizabeth, he cried:
"Well I must be going, Miss Watson, for I have an engagement. I promised to meet Fred Simpson and Beauclerc and another fellow presently—so I must be off. They want my opinion about some greyhounds Beauclerc has taken a fancy to but wouldn't buy till I had had time to see them. They are monstrous good fellows, and must not be kept waiting. Great friends of Osborne's, I assure you."
Nobody opposed his design: then turning with a softer tone and manner to Emma, he said,
"Really I must go to school again and take lessons from my little friend, to learn from him the art of finding agreeable conversation. What is the secret, Charles?"
"It is more easily explained than taught," replied Emma, "unaffected good-humour, sincerity, and simplicity. That is all!"
Tom took himself off, and as the sound of his curricle wheels died away in the distance, Mr. Watson observed:
"There goes a young man, who if he had had to work for his bread might have been a useful member of society. But unfortunately the father made a fortune, so the son can only make a fool of himself."