'Did Dr. Chellis tell you that,' said Mr. Bennett, with something like a sneer.
'No; I read it in the Christian Herald.'
'I thought so. Dr. Chellis has too much sense to utter such stuff.'
'Does Mr. Myrtle approve of waltzing?' inquired Hiram, with a groan.
'Hiram, don't be a goose. Of course, Mr. Myrtle does not exactly approve of it. That is, he don't waltz himself, his wife don't waltz, and his children are not old enough; but he does not object to any 'rational amusement,' and he leaves his congregation to decide what is rational.'
'Well, I shall not waltz, that's certain.'
'Yes you will, too. The girl you are to marry—the girl who has a clear two hundred thousand in her own right—she waltzes, and you have got to waltz.'
Hiram's head swam, as if already giddy in the revolving maze; but it was the thought of the two hundred thousand dollars, nothing else, which turned his brain. The color in his face went and came; he hesitated.
'I will think of it,' at last he ejaculated.
'Of course you will,' cried Mr. Bennett, 'of course you will, and decide like a sensible man afterward, not like an idiot; but you must decide quick, for I must put you in training for the fall campaign.'