Harry thanked the general for his kind feelings, and supposing that he knew from Sir Ralph and his mother exactly how things stood enlightened him yet further on the subject.
“You should not be surprised at their objecting on the score of the lady’s want of birth, charming as I doubt not she is,” observed the general. “I regret, as she has gone away, that I shall not have the pleasure of being introduced to her, and by pouring her praises into Sir Ralph’s ear, perhaps assist in softening his heart. However, as I said before, don’t despair, but keep up your spirits, and you will soon be too busy in your professional duties to allow your thoughts time to dwell on the subject.”
Harry again thanked him, and promised to follow his advice.
They reached Morbury. Harry proposed putting up their horses, and begged the general to take a few turns on the esplanade, as he had business which would occupy him some little time.
Harry was absent longer than he expected, and the general, after looking at his watch two or three times, began to wonder what he could be about.
“Can the fair lady have come to the place,” he thought. “Perhaps the young fellow has been making a cat’s-paw of me all the time, and has gone to church and got married, ha! ha! ha! that would be a joke; but by-the-bye it’s out of canonical hours; he cannot have done that then.”
He took another turn or two, exchanged a few words with the boatmen on the beach, looked about in the hopes of meeting an acquaintance, and resumed his seat on a bench facing the sea.
At last Harry made his appearance.
“What have you been about?” exclaimed the general. “I began to fear that you had given me the slip altogether, and that I should hear of you next at Gretna Green, or find that you had had a licence in your pocket all the time, and had been laughing in your sleeve while I was bestowing my sage advice on you.”
“No, indeed,” answered Harry, who did not like the general’s joke. “To confess the truth, I have been making my will. I thought it was a matter which would occupy five or ten minutes at the utmost, but found that there were all sorts of complications, of which I had not dreamed.”