“An interruption, gentlemen. You see if the story is told right, a man must feel what he says, and you’ll find out before it’s done, that I”—
“What, young man! You didn’t begin to make love to her did you?”
“Gentlemen, I must persist”—
“Well, was she in love—tell us that.”
“Love!—She laughed at it—and said, ‘she loved nothing but her pet fawn—her canary—the flowers, both wild and tame—the blue sky—the sunshine—the heather—the forest—the mountains—and it might be—she did not know—she might love her cousin Harry Hardwick, if he was as pleasant as he was when her playmate a few years ago—but he was now at his father’s castle on the mountain, and perhaps had grown coarse, boorish, or ill-mannered. She did not know therefore whether she should love him or not—rather thought she should not—but then she had her father, and enough around her to love and cherish, and why should she trouble herself about the matter.’
“You will not wonder, gentlemen, that such a creature should inspire me with love—a deep, devoted, heart-absorbing, deathless passion. I loved her as man never loved woman before. Every pulsation, every energy of my being seemed for her”—
“Of course, you’d love her!—never heard you tell of a pretty girl that you didn’t love—but give us the pith and marrow of the matter; did she return the compliment?”
“All in good time!—You see the thing might have been very handsomely managed, if it had not been for one or two impediments”—
“What in the plague does the fellow mean by impediment?”
“Hush, can’t you! He means he didn’t get her, of course.”