Page:The Small House at Allington Vol 1.djvu/224

202 "What; by getting a husband? But I suppose Dale must give her something. They're not married yet, you know, and, from what I hear, that fellow may prove a slippery customer. He'll not marry her unless old Dale gives her something. You'll see if he does. I'm told that he has got another string to his bow at Courcy Castle."

Soon after this, Crofts took his horse and rode home, having promised the earl that he would dine with him again before long.

"It'll be a great convenience to me if you'd come about that time," said the earl, "and as you're a bachelor perhaps you won't mind it. You'll come on Thursday at seven, will you? Take care of yourself. It's as dark as pitch. John, go and open the first gates for Dr. Crofts." And then the earl took himself off to bed.

Crofts, as he rode home, could not keep his mind from thinking of the two girls at Allington. "He'll not marry her unless old Dale gives her something." Had it come to that with the world, that a man must be bribed into keeping his engagement with a lady? Was there no romance left among mankind,—no feeling of chivalry? "He's got another string to his bow at Courcy Castle," said the earl; and his lordship seemed to be in no degree shocked as he said it. It was in this tone that men spoke of women now-a-days, and yet he himself had felt such awe of the girl he loved, and such a fear lest he might injure her in her worldly position, that he had not dared to tell her that he loved her.