I will marry you just whenever you like."
To make this sweet assurance doubly sweet, she stands on tiptoe, and,
slipping her arms round her lover's neck, kisses him with all her heart.

CHAPTER XXVII.

"About some act
That has no relish of salvation in't."
--_Hamlet._

"Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge."
--_Titus Andronicus._

"BEFORE you begin, Fabian, it is only fair to tell you that I will not
listen favorably to one word in his defense. Under the farsical term of
secretary, Slyme has been a disgrace and a torment to me for years; and
last night has finished everything."

"It was very unfortunate, no doubt," says Fabian, regretfully. "What a
curse the love of drink is!--a madness, a passion."

"I have told him he must go," says Sir Christopher, who is in a white
heat of rage, and is walking up and down the room with an indignant
frown upon his face. Just now, stopping short before Fabian, he drops
into a seat and says, testily, "_Unfortunate!_ _that_ is no word to use
about it. Why, look you how it stands; you invite people to your house
to dine, and on your way to your dining-room, with a lady on your arm,
you are accosted and insolently addressed by one of your household--your
secretary, forsooth--_so_ drunk that it was shameful! He reeled! I give
you my word, sir--he _reeled_! I thought Lady Chetwoode would have
fainted: she turned as pale as her gown, and but for her innate pluck
would have cried aloud. It was insufferable, Fabian. Waste no more words
over him, for go he shall."

"After all these years," says Fabian, thoughtfully, thrumming gently on
the table near him with his forefinger.

All night long the storm has raged with unexampled fury, and even yet
its anger is fierce and high as when first it hurled itself upon a
sleeping world. The raindrops are pattering madly against the
window-panes, through the barren branches of the elms the wind is
shrieking, now rising far above the heads of the tallest trees, now
descending to the very bosom of the earth, and, flying over it, drives
before its mighty breath all such helpless things as are defenceless and
at its mercy.

Perhaps the noise of this tempest outside drowns the keen sense of
hearing in those within, because neither Fabian nor Sir Christopher
stir, or appear at all conscious of the opening of a door at the upper
end