"You think so? I don't say she's worse than any other girl who's got such a pull in the way of looks, brains, family, and all the rest of it. But none of us like to go cheap, and the love in a cottage business, or even a man like yourself of good county family, but not rich, not distinguished—h'm—as yet, not a power socially or politically in the land, is scarcely a high bid for a first-class property in the marriage market like Hypatia Tollemache."
"My dear Miss Branksome, don't talk like that. It pains me, I assure you."
"Perhaps it does, but it will do you good in the long run. It's pretty true, as you'll find out in time. And now, as I hear Lady Roxburgh coming downstairs, and I've talked enough nonsense for one morning, I'll go and get ready for the drag party. You'll know soon that I have no personal interest in the matter, though I've liked you always, and don't wish to see your life spoiled by a sentimental mistake."
And so this very frank young woman departed, just in time to meet the hostess, who, coming forward, explained her late arrival at the breakfast table by saying that she had to send off messages about the picnic party and an impromptu dance for the evening. She verified Miss Branksome's information respecting the drag, and the responsible office of coachman which Sir Roland expressed himself most willing to accept. But all the time he was suitably attiring himself; and even during a visit of inspection to the stables for the purpose of interviewing the well-matched team, and having a word or two with the head groom, a feeling of doubt would obtrude itself as he recalled the well-meant, unconventional warning of Miss Bessie Branksome.
"I suppose women know a good deal more about each other's ways than we do," he reflected. "But an average girl like Miss Branksome, good-hearted and well-intentioned, as she no doubt is, can no more enter into the motives of a woman like Miss Tollemache than a milkmaid could gauge the soul of a duchess. In any case, I must take my chance, and I shall have the satisfaction of taking my dismissal from her lips alone, for no other earthly authority will detach me from the pursuit. So that's settled."
And when Roland Massinger made use of that expression in soliloquy or otherwise, a certain line of action was definitely followed. Neither obstacles nor dissuasions had the smallest weight with him. In general, he took pains to work out his plans and to form his opinion before committing himself to them. This, however, he admitted, was an exception to his rule of life. Rule of life? It was his life—his soul, mind, body—everything. "Whatever stirs this mortal frame"—of course. What did Byron say about love? "'Tis woman's whole existence." Byron didn't know: he had long since squandered the riches of the heart, the boundless wealth of the affections. He could write about love. But the real enthralling, all-absorbing, reverential passion of a true man's honest love, he did not know, never could have known, and was incapable of feeling.
After this burst of blasphemy against the acknowledged high priest of "Venus Victrix," the great singer of "love, and love's sharp woe," Sir Roland felt relieved, if not comforted.
Then came the more mundane business of the day. The girls' chatter, always more or less sweet in his ears, like the half-notes of thrushes in spring; the arranging of pairs, and the small difficulties in mounting to the high seats of the drag; the monosyllabic utterances of the swells, civil and military, who helped to compose the party, at length came to an end.
Finally, when, with pretty, lively, amusing Miss Branksome on the box seat beside him, he started the well-matched team, and, rattling down the avenue, swept through the park gates, and turned into the road which led to St. Wereburgh's, he felt once more in comparative harmony with his surroundings.