“For the state in which I find her. And mind my words, Kingsward, you’d better let your girl marry anybody that isn’t a blackguard than risk that sort of shock with your wife. Never forget that her life—— I mean to say that she’s very delicate. Don’t let her be worried—stretch a point—have things done as she wishes. You will find it pay best in the end.”
“For once you are talking nonsense, my dear fellow,” said Colonel Kingsward; “my wife is not a woman who has ever been set upon having her own way.”
“Let her have it this time,” said the doctor, “and you’ll never repent it. If she wants Bee to marry, let her marry. Bee is a dear little thing, but her mother, Kingsward, her mother—is of far more consequence to you than even she—”
“That is a matter of course,” said Colonel Kingsward. “Lucy is of more importance to me than all the world beside; but neither must I neglect the interests of my child.”
“Oh, bother the child,” cried the doctor, “let her have her lover; the mother is what you must think of now.”
“You seem tremendously in earnest, Southwood.”
“So I am—tremendously in earnest. And don’t you work your mind on the subject, but do what I say.”
“Do you mean to say that my wife is in a—state of danger?”
“I mean that she must be kept from worry—she must not be contradicted—things must not be allowed to go contrary to her wishes. Poor little Bee! I don’t say you are to let her marry a blackguard. But don’t worry her mother about it—that is the chief thing I’ve got to say.”
“No, I shan’t worry her mother about it,” said the Colonel, shutting his mouth closely as if he were locking it up. When Dr. Southwood was gone, however, he stopped the two girls who were lingering about to know the doctor’s opinion, and detaching Betty’s arm from about Bee’s waist drew his eldest daughter into his study and shut the door. “I want to speak to you, Bee,” he said.