Page:The Small House at Allington Vol 2.djvu/249

Rh over, you know, and get the mother on your side, if you can. I take it, the truth is this;—you mustn't be angry with me, you know, for saying it."

"You may be sure of that."

"I suppose she was fond of that fellow, Crosbie. She can't be very fond of him now, I should think, after the way he has treated her; but she'll find a difficulty in making her confession that she really likes you better than she ever liked him. Of course that's what you'll want her to say."

"I want her to say that she'll be my wife,—some day."

"And when she has agreed to the some day, then you'll begin to press her to agree to your day;—eh, sir? My belief is you'll bring her round. Poor girl! why should she break her heart when a decent fellow like you will only be too glad to make her a happy woman?" And in this way the earl talked to Eames till the latter almost believed that the difficulties were vanishing from out of his path. "Could it be possible," he asked himself, as he went to bed, "that in a fortnight's time Lily Dale should have accepted him as her future husband?" Then he remembered that day on which Crosbie, with the two girls, had called at his mother's house, when, in the bitterness of his heart, he had sworn to himself that he would always regard Crosbie as his enemy. Since then the world had gone well with him; and he had no longer any very bitter feeling against Crosbie. That matter had been arranged on the platform of the Paddington Station. He felt that if Lily would now accept him he could almost shake hands with Crosbie. The episode in his life and in Lily's would have been painful; but he would learn to look back upon that without regret, if Lily could be taught to believe that a kind fate had at last given her to the better of her two lovers. "I'm afraid she won't bring herself to forget him," he had said to the earl. "She'll only be too happy to forget him," the earl had answered, "if you can induce her to begin the attempt. Of course it is very bitter at first;—all the world knew about it; but, poor girl, she is not to be wretched for ever, because of that. Do you go about your work with some little confidence, and I don't doubt but what you'll have your way. You have everybody in your favour,—the squire, her mother, and all." While such words as these were in his ears how could he fail to hope and to be confident? While he was sitting cozily over his bedroom fire he resolved that it should be as the earl had said. But when he got up on the following morning, and stood