"Very well, sir," he said, pulling up his collar, as if he had whiskers to push it down, "whatever I am told in confidence is allowed to go no further. It is scarcely necessary for me to say that I reserve, of course, the final right of reference to my honour."
"To be sure, and to your ripe judgment and almost patriarchal experience, Kit. Then be it known to you, aged youth, that you have not shown hoar sagacity. You do not even know who the lady is whom you have honoured with your wise addresses."
"And I don't care a d—n who she is," cried Kit, "so long as I love her, and she loves me!"
"My son, you are turbulent and hasty. Your wisdom has left you suddenly. Your manners also; or you would not swear in the presence of your father."
"Sir, I was wrong; and I beg your pardon. But I think that I learned the first way of it from you."
"Kit, Kit, recall that speech! You must have gone altogether dreaming lately. My discourse is always moderate, and to the last degree professional. However, in spite of the generous impulse, which scarcely seems natural at your threescore years and ten, it does seem a needful precaution to learn the name, style, and title of the lady whom you will vow to love, honour, and—obey."
"Her name," cried Kit, without any sense of legal phrase and jingle, "is Grace Holland. Her style is a great deal better than anybody else's. And as for title, such rubbish is unknown in the gigantic young nation to which she belongs."
"Her name," said Mr. Sharp, setting his face for the conquest of this boy, and fixing keen hard eyes upon him, "is Grace Oglander, the daughter of the old Squire of Beckley. Her style—in your sense of the word—is that of a rustic young lady; and her title, by courtesy, is Miss—a barbarous modern abbreviation."
The youth was at first too much amazed to say a word; for he was not quick-witted, as his father was. He gave a little gasp, and his fine brown eyes, which he could not remove from his father's, changed their expression from defiance to doubt, and from doubt to fear, and from fear to sorrow, with a little dawning of contempt. "Why, my man, is this beyond your experience of life?" asked Luke Sharp, trying to look his son down, but failing, and beginning to grow uneasy. Kit's face was aflame with excitement, and his lips were trembling; but his eyes grew stern.
"Father, I hope you do not mean what you have said—that you are only joking with me—at any rate, that you have not known it—that you have not done it—that you have not even left poor old Mr. Oglander one hour——"