Peggie gave her hearty acquiescence and returned to her book, and for some time no sound was heard except an occasional smothered laugh, when Mr. Pope's highly-spiced rhymes tickled her fancy more than usual. Prue fell into a somber reverie, and with the tip of her taper finger between her teeth, became so buried in thought, that a sharp little line began to trace itself distinctly between her drawn brows. Outside, the newsman's voice, gradually fading in the distance, still repeated, "Buy the life and confessions of Robin Freemantle, the notorious highwayman—only sixpence."
Prue sprang to her feet, at last. "Margaret!" she exclaimed, and her voice had a curiously unfamiliar ring.
Her cousin started. Prue had not called her by her full name in many a day.
"Margaret, if this highwayman has no wife—people of that sort don't marry, usually—what is to prevent his marrying me, and leaving me a widow on Monday, with all my debts buried in his coffin?"
Peggie had been so often participator and prime minister of Prue's exploits, that she was not easily astonished by her. But this proposition was so entirely outside the bounds of reason, that she could only shake her head vigorously, without even a word of protest.
"'Tis not so reckless as it seems, Peggie," said Prue, sitting down beside her and passing a coaxing arm round her shoulders. "Listen, dear Peg. The man must die; God's pity on him! What can it matter to me to be his wife for a few hours; what can it matter to him to ease me of my debts? They will not trouble him in the next world; neither will I."
"You'll be none the richer for such a mad freak," Peggie remonstrated.
"I'll be out of danger of the Fleet, though!" cried Prue, renewing her caresses. "Fancy your poor little cousin in a debtors' prison, Peggie, with all sorts of wretches who can not pay their butchers and bakers—and miserable cheats and swindlers, so mean and low that they have not a soul to help them—and fancy me just as ill-off and forlorn as they!" Peggie began to melt. "You saw that letter from Madame Taffetine's lawyer, 'Unless we receive the payment, so frequently promised, within forty-eight hours, the law will be enforced without any further delay.' The other man is even more explicit; he threatens me with imprisonment in so many words! Oh! Peggie, I am the most miserable girl in the world!"
"Sir Geoffrey will marry you, and you will both be safe and happy," counseled Peggie.
"Sir Geoffrey! I'm not so sure I wouldn't rather marry the highwayman!" cried Prue. "At any rate, I can not offer myself to him, and I doubt if he be in the mood to hurry me. Besides, there's like to be a dissolution of Parliament, and then he'll be in a worse plight than I am now. 'Tis true," she laughed, but not quite merrily, "there is Mr. Aarons, who was kind enough to place his hand and his money-bags at my feet, but the doors that are open to the poor Viscountess Brooke, might be slammed in the face of the rich Lady Prudence Aarons!"