"When we spread the news abroad, everybody in Lynn will feel that the greatest honour has been done to the town as well as to this house."
"Sir, you overrate my position. Still … however, we must keep the matter secret for a day or two yet. I engage you, captain, to profound secrecy."
"As long as you please, my lord. The sooner I may speak of it the better I shall like it, for I am bursting with joy and satisfaction."
"Patience, captain, for a day or two."
The captain became serious, even melancholy. "You will take her away, I suppose."
"I fear I must. A married man generally takes away his wife, does he not?"
"You will take her to your country house, and to London. Well, I am old—I am seventy-five already. I cannot expect ever to see her again. Her mother, however, is not so old by thirty years. Perhaps your lordship will at some time or other—we would not remind you of your lady's humble folk—allow her if she is within an easy journey to come here to see her mother."
"Surely—surely, captain. Could I be so hard-hearted as to refuse? Her mother certainly—or yourself. But not her old friends. Not the friends of her childhood such as that young sailor man—nor the girls of the place."
"I care not for them, so that I may comfort her poor mother with that promise. As for myself, who am I that I should intrude upon her? Let me die happy in the knowledge that she is happy."
"She shall be as happy as the day is long, captain."