Mr. Dinks hoped certainly that he never should.  “But I sha’n’t be a very hard husband, Fanny.  I shall let you do pretty much as you want to.”

“Dearest, I know you will,” rejoined his charmer.  “But the thing is now to know whether your mother has seen Hope Wayne.”

“I’ll go and ask her,” said Alfred, rising.

“My dear fellow,” replied Fanny, with her mouth screwed into a semblance of smiling, “you’ll drive me distracted.  I must insist on common sense.  It is too delicate a question for you to ask.”

Mr. Dinks grinned and look bewildered.  Then he assumed a very serious expression.

“It doesn’t seem to me to be hard to ask my mother if she has seen my cousin.”

“Pooh! you silly—­I mean, my precious darling, your mother’s too smart for you.  She’d have every thing out of you in a twinkling.”

“I suppose she would,” said Alfred, meekly.

Fanny Newt wagged her foot very rapidly, and looked fixedly upon the floor.  Alfred gazed at her admiringly—­thought what a splendid Mrs. Alfred Dinks he had secured, and smacked his lips as if he were tasting her.  He kissed his hand to her as he sat.  He kissed the air toward her.  He might as well have blown kisses to the brown spire of Trinity Church.

“Alfred, you must solemnly promise me one thing,” she said, at length.

“Sweet,” said Alfred, who began to feel that he had dined very much, indeed—­“sweet, come here!”

Fanny flushed and wrinkled her brow.  Mr. Dinks was frightened.

“Oh no, dear—­no, not at all,” said he.

“My love,” said she, in a voice as calm but as black as her eyes, “do you promise or not?  That’s all.”

Poor Dinks!  He said Yes, in a feeble way, and hoped she wouldn’t be angry.  Indeed—­indeed, he didn’t know how much he had been drinking.  But the fellers kept ordering wine, and he had to drink on; and, oh! dear, he wouldn’t do so again if Fanny would only forgive him.  Dear, dear Fanny, please to forgive a miserable feller!  And Miss Newt’s betrothed sobbed, and wept, and half writhed on the sofa in maudlin woe.

Fanny stood erect, patting the floor with her foot and looking at this spectacle.  She thought she had counted the cost.  But the price seemed at this instant a little high.  Twenty-two years old now, and if she lived to be only seventy, then forty-eight years of Alfred Dinks!  It was a very large sum, indeed.  But Fanny bethought her of the balm in Gilead.  Forty-eight years of married life was very different from an engagement of that period. Courage, ma chere!

“Alfred,” said she, at length, “listen to me.  Go to your mother before she goes to bed to-night, and say to her that there are reasons why she must not speak of your engagement to any body, not even to Hope Wayne.  And if she begins to pump you, tell her that it is the especial request of the lady—­whom you may call ‘she,’ you needn’t say Hope—­that no question of any kind shall be asked, or the engagement may be broken.  Do you understand, dear?”