’Then be unruffled again, like my own dear, honest Clara.  I have been ruffled too, but I’ll be as tranquil now as a drawing-room cat.’  Then Mrs Askerton got up from her chair, and seated herself by Clara’s side on the sofa.  ’Come; you can’t go till you’ve told me; and if you hesitate, I shall think that you mean to quarrel With me.’

‘I’ll come to you tomorrow.’

’No, no; you shall tell me today.  All tomorrow you’ll be preparing for your cousin.’

‘What nonsense!’

’Or else you’ll come prepared to vindicate him, and then we shan’t get on any further.  Tell me what it is today.  You can’t leave me in curiosity after what you have said.’

‘You’ve heard of Captain Aylmer, I think.’

‘Of course I’ve heard of him.’

‘But you’ve never seen him?’

‘You know I never have.’

‘I told you that he was at Perivale when Mrs Winterfield died.’

’And now he has proposed, and you are going to accept him?  That will indeed be important.  Is it so? say.  But don’t I know it is so?  Why don’t you speak?’

‘If you know it, why need I speak?’

’But it is so?  Oh, Clara, I am so glad.  I congratulate you with all my heart with all my heart.  My dearest, dearest Clara!  What a happy arrangement!  What a success!  It is just as it should be.  Dear, good man! to come forward in that sensible way, and put an end to all the little family difficulties!’

‘I don’t know so much about success.  Who is it that is successful?’

‘You, to be sure.’

‘Then by the same measurement he must be unsuccessful.’

‘Don’t be a fool, Clara.’

’Of course I have been successful if I’ve got a man that I can love as my husband.’

’Now, my dear, don’t be a fool.  Of course all that is between you and him, and I don’t in the least doubt that it is all as it should be.  If Captain Aylmer had been the elder brother instead of the younger, and had all the Aylmer estates instead of the Perivale property, I know you would not accept him if you did not like him.’

‘I hope not.’

’I am sure you would not.  But when a girl with nothing a year has managed to love a man with two or three thousand a year, and has managed to be loved by him in return instead of going through the same process with the curate or village doctor it is a success, and her friend will always think so.  And when a girl marries a gentleman, and a Member of Parliament, instead of well, I’m not going to say anything personal her friends will congratulate her upon his position.  It may be very wicked, and mercenary, and all that; but it’s the way of the world.’

‘I hate hearing about the world.’

’Yes, my dear; all proper young ladies like you do hate it.  But I observe that such girls as you never offend its prejudices.  You can’t but know that you would have done a wicked as well as a foolish thing to marry a man without an adequate income.’