Do pray hear me out. I won't breathe
your name or your father's. I'll describe you as 'a young lady
to whom I am devotedly attached.' And if my friend the clerk
asks where you live, I'll say the north of Scotland, or the west
of Ireland, or the Channel Islands, or anywhere else you like.
My friend the clerk is a total stranger to Thorpe Ambrose and
everybody in it (which is one recommendation); and in five
minutes' time he'd put me up to what to do (which is another). If
you only knew him! He's one of those extraordinary men who appear
once or twice in a century--the sort of man who won't allow you
to make a mistake if you try. All I have got to say to him
(putting it short) is, 'My dear fellow, I want to be privately
married without perjury.' All he has got to say to me (putting it
short) is, 'You must do so-and-so and so-and-so, and you must be
careful to avoid this, that, and the other.' I have nothing
in the world to do but to follow his directions; and you have
nothing in the world to do but what the bride always does
when the bridegroom is ready and willing!" His arm stole round
Neelie's waist, and his lips pointed the moral of the last
sentence with that inarticulate eloquence which is so uniformly
successful in persuading a woman against her will.
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