For one good hour, therefore, the labour of many hours kept him dumb.  Ripton was fortifying himself so as to forget him altogether, and the world as well, till the next morning.  Ripton was excited, overdone with delight.  He had already finished one bottle, and listened, pleasantly flushed, to his emphatic and more abstemious chief.  He had nothing to do but to listen, and to drink.  The hero would not allow him to shout Victory! or hear a word of toasts; and as, from the quantity of oil poured on it, his eloquence was becoming a natural force in his bosom, the poor fellow was afflicted with a sort of elephantiasis of suppressed emotion.  At times he half-rose from his chair, and fell vacuously into it again; or he chuckled in the face of weighty, severely-worded instructions; tapped his chest, stretched his arms, yawned, and in short behaved so singularly that Richard observed it, and said:  “On my soul, I don’t think you know a word I’m saying.”

“Every word, Ricky!” Ripton spirted through the opening.  “I’m going down to your governor, and tell him:  Sir Austin!  Here’s your only chance of being a happy father—­no, no!—­Oh! don’t you fear me, Ricky!  I shall talk the old gentleman over.”

His chief said: 

“Look here.  You had better not go down to-night.  Go down the first thing to-morrow, by the six o’clock train.  Give him my letter.  Listen to me—­give him my letter, and don’t speak a word till he speaks.  His eyebrows will go up and down, he won’t say much.  I know him.  If he asks you about her, don’t be a fool, but say what you think of her sensibly”—­

No cork could hold in Ripton when she was alluded to.  He shouted:  “She’s an angel!”

Richard checked him:  “Speak sensibly, I say—­quietly.  You can say how gentle and good she is—­my fleur-de-luce!  And say, this was not her doing.  If any one’s to blame, it’s I. I made her marry me.  Then go to Lady Blandish, if you don’t find her at the house.  You may say whatever you please to her.  Give her my letter, and tell her I want to hear from her immediately.  She has seen Lucy, and I know what she thinks of her.  You will then go to Farmer Blaize.  I told you Lucy happens to be his niece—­she has not lived long there.  She lived with her aunt Desborough in France while she was a child, and can hardly be called a relative to the farmer—­there’s not a point of likeness between them.  Poor darling! she never knew her mother.  Go to Mr. Blaize, and tell him.  You will treat him just as you would treat any other gentleman.  If you are civil, he is sure to be.  And if he abuses me, for my sake and hers you will still treat him with respect.  You hear?  And then write me a full account of all that has been said and done.  You will have my address the day after to-morrow.  By the way, Tom will be here this afternoon.  Write out for him where to call on you the day after to-morrow, in case you have heard anything in the morning you think I ought to know at once, as Tom will join me that night.  Don’t mention to anybody about my losing the ring, Ripton.  I wouldn’t have Adrian get hold of that for a thousand pounds.  How on earth I came to lose it!  How well she bore it, Rip!  How beautifully she behaved!”