tmas bills)
there would be an insurrection, conducted by the father with much spirit
for a time, but ultimately yielding to the forces of the government.
Florence had many admirers; a pretty woman, who habitually rules a rich
father, is bound to have many admirers. But she had two in particular;
her cousin, Ralph Martin, who had been apprenticed to her father, and
Adam Tellwright, a tile manufacturer at Turnhill.

These four--the father and daughter and the rivals--had been playing
tennis that Saturday afternoon. Mr Bostock, though touching on fifty,
retained a youthful athleticism; he looked and talked younger than his
years, and he loved the society of young people. If he wandered solitary
and moody about the tennis-court now, it was because he had a great deal
on his mind besides business. He had his daughter's future on his mind.

A servant with apron-strings waving like flags in the breeze came from
the house with a large loaded tea-tray, and deposited it on a wicker
table on the small lawn at the end of the ash court. The rivals were
reclining in deck chairs close to the table; the Object of Desire, all
in starched white, stood over the table and with quick delicious
movements dropped sugar and poured milk into tinkling porcelain.

"Now, father," she called briefly, without looking up, as she seized the
teapot.

He approached, gazing thoughtfully at the group. Yes, he was worried.
And everyone was secretly worried. The situation was exceedingly
delicate, fragile, breakable. Mr Bostock looked uneasily first at Adam
Tellwright, tall, spick and span, self-confident, clever, shining, with
his indubitable virtues mainly on the outside. If ever any man of
thirty-two in all this world was eligible, Adam Tellwright was.
Decidedly he had a reputation for preternaturally keen smartness in
trade, but in trade that cannot be called a defect; on the contrary, if
a man has virtues, you cannot precisely quarrel with him because they
happen to be on the outside; the principal thing is to have virtues. And
then Mr Bostock looked uneasily at Ralph Martin, heavy, short, dark,
lowering, untidy, often incomprehensible, and more often rude; with
virtues concealed as if they were secret shames. Ralph was capricious.
At moments he showed extraordinary talent as an engineer; at others he
behaved like a nincompoop. He would be rich one day; but he had a
formidable temper. The principal thing in favour of Ralph Martin was
that he and Fl