When the meal was over Mary followed her father into the office and said that she wanted to speak to him.  When Sundown had disappeared she told her tale.  “Papa,” she said, “I am so sorry, but I can’t do what you want about Mr. Twentyman.”

“Is it so, Mary?”

“Don’t be angry with me, papa.”

“Angry!  No;—­I won’t be angry.  I should be very sorry to be angry with my girl.  But what you tell me will make us all very unhappy;—­ very unhappy indeed.  What will you say to Lawrence Twentyman?”

“What I said before, papa.”

“But he is quite certain now that you mean to take him.  Of course we were all certain when you only wanted a few more days to think of it.”  Mary felt this to be the cruellest thing of all.  “When he asked me I said I wouldn’t pledge you, but I certainly had no doubt.  What is the matter, Mary?”

She could understand that a girl might be asked why she wanted to marry a man, and that in such a condition she ought to be able to give a reason; but it was she thought very hard that she should be asked why she didn’t want to marry a man.  “I suppose, papa,” she said after a pause, “I don’t like him in that way.”

“Your mamma will be sure to say that it is because you went to Lady Ushant’s.”

And so in part it was,—­as Mary herself very well knew; though Lady Ushant herself had had nothing to do with it.  “Lady Ushant,” she said, “would be very well pleased,—­if she thought that I liked him well enough.”

“Did you tell Lady Ushant?”

“Yes; I told her all about it,—­and how you would all be pleased.  And I did try to bring myself to it.  Papa,—­pray, pray don’t want to send me away from you.”

“You would be so near to us all at Chowton Farm!”

“I am nearer here, papa.”  Then she embraced him, and he in a manner yielded to her.  He yielded to her so far as to part with her at the present moment with soft loving words.

Mrs. Masters had a long conversation with her husband on the subject that same day, and condescended even to say a few words to the two girls.  She had her own theory and her own plan in the present emergency.  According to her theory girls shouldn’t be indulged in any vagaries, and this rejecting of a highly valuable suitor was a most inexcusable vagary.  And, if her plan were followed, a considerable amount of wholesome coercion would at once be exercised towards this refractory young woman.  There was in fact more than a fortnight wanting to the expiration of Larry’s two months, and Mrs. Masters was strongly of opinion that if Mary were put into a sort of domestic “coventry” during this period, if she were debarred from friendly intercourse with the family and made to feel that such wickedness as hers, if continued, would make her an outcast, then she would come round and accept Larry Twentyman before the end of the time.  But this plan could not be carried out without her husband’s co-operation.  Were she to attempt it single-handed, Mary would take refuge in her father’s softness of heart and there would simply be two parties in the household.  “If you would leave her to me and not speak to her, it would be all right,” Mrs. Masters said to her husband.