“Therefore gentility alone is no guarantee of suitability.  The only gentlemanliness she needs in a husband is ordinary good address, presentable manners, sense enough to avoid ridiculous solecisms in society, and so forth.  Marian is satisfied with me on these points; and her approval settles the question finally.  As to rank, I am a skilled workman, the first in my trade; and it is only by courtesy and forbearance that I suffer any man to speak of my class as inferior.  Take us all, professions and trades together; and you will find by actual measurement round the head and round the chest, and round our manners and characters, if you like, that we are the only genuine aristocracy at present in existence.  Therefore I meet your objection to my rank with a point-blank assertion of its superiority.  Now let us have the other objections, if there are any others.”

The clergyman received this challenge in silence.  Then, after clearing his throat uneasily twice, he said: 

“I had hoped, Mr. Conolly, to have been able to persuade you on general grounds to relinquish your design.  But as you are evidently not within reach of those considerations which I am accustomed to see universally admitted, it becomes my painful duty to assure you that a circumstance, on the secrecy of which you are relying, is known to me, and, through me, to my father.”

“What circumstance is that?”

“A circumstance connected with Mr. Marmaduke Lind, whom you mentioned just now.  You understand me, I presume?”

“Oh! you have found that out?”

“I have.  It only remains for me to warn my sister that she is about to contract a close relationship with one who is—­I must say it—­living in sin with our cousin.”

“What do you suppose will be the result of that?”

“I leave you to imagine,” said the clergyman indignantly, rising.

“Stop a bit.  You do not understand me yet, I see.  You have said that my views are peculiar.  What if I have taken the peculiar view that I was bound to tell Marian this before proposing to her, and have actually told her?”

“But surely—­That is not very likely.”

“The whole affair is not very likely.  Our marriage is not likely; but it is going to happen, nevertheless.  She knows this circumstance perfectly well.  You told her yourself.”

“I!  When?”

“The year before last, at Carbury Towers.  It is worth your consideration, too, that by mistrusting Marian at that time, and refusing to give her my sister’s address, you forced her to appeal to me for help, and so advanced me from the position of consulting electrician to that of friend in need.  She knew nothing about my relationship to the woman in a state of sin (as you call it), and actually deputed me to warn your cousin of the risk he was running by his intimacy with her.  Whilst I was away running this queer errand for her, she found out that the woman was my sister, and of course rushed to the conclusion