CHAPTER XVI.
"But how are you to ask us to the wedding, Alfred, considering we don't even visit?" said Louisa one morning to her brother, who stood as usual at the window, but now without even the pretext of a book.
"Nonsense, Louisa!" he replied. "Wedding, indeed! I wish it were come to that! and it would be easy to arrange the visiting. By-the-by, ma'am," he added, turning to his mother, "independent of Louisa's jesting, I wish we did visit."
"So do I, my dear," replied Lady Arden, "but Lady Palliser, of the two, was here rather before I was; besides she is a person of the highest rank, so that I think the first advances ought to come from her. They say too, her ladyship is going to give a great fancy ball, and it would look as if I wanted to have the girls asked. However, I should suppose we must visit soon, one way or other; for Louisa's jesting as you call it, appears to me to go on in as serious a manner as you could desire."
"Oh—I—a—don't know, ma'am," said Alfred, colouring, and pulling off and on an unfortunate glove, which seemed destined to be martyred in the cause.
"Why certainly," persisted Lady Arden, "neither Lady Caroline, nor her mother for her, would be justified in receiving either your public attentions or your daily visits in the manner they do, if they meant to make the only objection which could be made to you—your being a younger son."
"Well—I hope you may be right, ma'am;" said Alfred, laughing, and escaping into the garden to hide his confusion.
"He will be a fortunate young man if he gets Lady Caroline Montague," said Aunt Dorothea.
"Not more fortunate than he deserves, Mrs. Dorothea," replied Lady Arden, "for he is the best creature in the world, as well as the handsomest and the most agreeable."
"No one can be more sensible of my nephew's merits than I am," said Mrs. Dorothea; "but I still maintain that few, even of the few who deserve as well, are as fortunate. Lady Caroline Montague, I understand, inherits the whole of the family estates, and her son, should she have one, will I suppose have the title."