'Your cousin George is to be married at last. So I hear, at least. He loves wisely, if not well; for his widow has the name of being prudent and fairly well to do in the world. She has also got over the caprices of her youth. Dear aunt De Courcy will be so delighted. I might perhaps have met her at Gatherum Castle. I do so regret it.
'Mr. Moffat has turned up again. We all thought you had finally extinguished him. He left a card the other day, and I have told the servant always to say that I am at home, and that you are with me. He is going to stand for some borough in the west of Ireland. He's used to shilelaghs by this time.
'By-the-by, I have a cadeau for a friend of yours. I won't tell you what it is, nor permit you to communicate the fact. But when you tell me that in sending it I may fairly congratulate her on having so devoted a slave as you, it shall be sent.
'If you have nothing better to do at present, do come and see my invalid at Malvern. Perhaps you might have a mind to treat for the oil of Lebanon. I'll give you all the assistance I can in cheating my lawyers.'****
There was not much about Mary in this; but still, the little that was said made him again declare that neither father nor mother should move him from his resolution. 'I will write to her and say that she may send her present when she pleases. Or I will run down to Malvern for a day. It will do me good to see her.' And so resolved, he rode away to Mill Hill, thinking, as he went, how he would put the matter to Harry Baker.
Harry was at home; but we need not describe the whole interview. Had Frank been asked beforehand, he would have declared, that on no possible subject could he have had the slightest hesitation in asking Harry any question, or communicating to him any tidings. But when the time came, he found that he did hesitate much. He did not want to ask his friend if he should be wise to marry Mary Thorne. Wise or not, he was determined to do that. But he wished to be quite sure that his mother was wrong in saying that all the world would dissuade him from it. Miss Dunstable, at any rate, did not do so.
At last, seated on a stile at the back of the Mill Hill stables, while Harry stood close before him with both his hands in his pockets, he did get his story told. It was by no means the first time that Harry Baker had heard about Mary Thorne, and he was not, therefore, so surprised as he might have been, had the affair been new to him. And thus, standing there in the position we have described, did Mr. Baker, junior, give utterance to such wisdom as was in him on this subject.
