The Prodigal Father Part 34

"An engagement?"

"What's an engagement? Speaking as a lawyer of many years' standing, I may tell you candidly that engagements, and agreements, and bargains are simply devices for keeping rascals from swindling one another. If honest men agree, they don't need a stamped bit of paper; and if they disagree, where's the point in leas.h.i.+ng them together, like a couple of growling dogs? And the case is a thousand times stronger when it comes to a man and a girl. I was only afraid I should lose a charming daughter-in-law, and now you've taken that weight off my mind. I can't tell you how happy I feel!"

Frank's young face was grave and his candid eyes looked straight at his father.

"Look here," he replied, "I'm going to do the straight thing by Andrew.

I don't know that I've ever loved him as much as I ought, but that's all the more reason why I shouldn't chisel him now."

"Oh, that's your military idea of discipline and all the rest of it; but let me tell you, falling in love is a different kind of thing from forming fours."

For the first time the young soldier clearly disapproved of his father's rejuvenation.

"Duty is duty," he persisted, "and I tell you honestly I'm not going to sneak in behind my brother's back."

"Is Ellen to have nothing to say in the matter? Do you propose to marry her to the man she doesn't love, instead of the man she does, without so much as giving her the choice?"

The soldier met this flank attack by a change of front.

"But Andrew has the means to marry her, and I've not."

"I'll give you the means," said his father.

Frank began to realize that Duty was in a very tight corner.

"But I haven't any grounds whatever for thinking that Ellen cares for me."

"I have."

"You'll have to convince _me_."

"Is it not clearly your duty to settle that point first?"

Frank hesitated.

"Well--perhaps it is."

The crafty strategist smiled.

"We'll settle it!"

"When?"

"At once. Where's a time-table?"

"But look here, my dear father, there's the question of honor to be settled after that."

"After that--exactly; I'm with you all the way. But in the meanwhile, first get this into your head. An engagement is an affair of two hearts, not of two pockets or two heads. If the hearts are off, the bargain's off. That's the whole ethics of an engagement. And let me tell you I'm not without some experience."

"Heriot!" exclaimed a familiar voice.

The W.S. looked round with a start. There, through the middle of the hall, attired in a most becoming traveling coat of fur, advanced the sympathetic widow.

"My dear Madge!" cried her betrothed.

Almost in the same instant his off eye signaled to his son a hurried but expressive warning.

CHAPTER XIII

The hour was late, but in spite of Heriot's kindly suggestion that the rapture he antic.i.p.ated from her conversation should be postponed till she had recovered from the fatigues of her journey, his fiancee unselfishly preferred to recompense him immediately for his prolonged deprivation of her society. He acceded at once to her wishes, with the most amiable air imaginable.

"And now, my dear Madge," said he, when they were seated in a secluded corner of the lounge, "tell me all your news. In the first place, how's my own precious?"

"I am very well, thank you," replied the lady, a little coolly.

"Delighted to hear it!"

"You could, of course, have discovered it sooner by simply writing to inquire," she pointed out, with the same air.

"But I did, my dear girl, I did."

"Once."

"Only once, was it? Now, I could have sworn it was twice."

"And did you think twice was often enough?"

"Well, you see, Madge," he explained, "we got engaged in such a deuce of a hurry, and I had to rush off next morning, and so on. I didn't have time to ask you how often you wished me to write."

"Didn't my last two unanswered letters give you any idea on the subject?"

"Two letters, Madge? Now, do you know, I could have sworn it was only one."

She looked at him steadily.

"Heriot, what is the meaning of your conduct?"

"To what points in it do you refer, my dear?"

"I may tell you I have heard from Charlie Munro."

It was remarkable how quickly Mr. Walkingshaw had developed. That reputation he still clung to when he saw her last was no longer a brake upon his downward career.

"Poor old Charlie!" he laughed. "By Jove, Madge, I jolly well hoisted him with his own thingamajig!"

She regarded him stonily.