or at any rate had
suspected, that Peregrine Orme looked on her daughter with favouring
eyes. Now Peregrine Orme would have satisfied Lady Staveley as a
son-in-law. She liked his ways and manners of thought--in spite of
those rumours as to the rat-catching which had reached her ears. She
regarded him as quite clever enough to be a good husband, and no
doubt appreciated the fact that he was to inherit his title and The
Cleeve from an old grandfather instead of a middle-aged father. She
therefore had no objection to leave Peregrine alone with her one
ewe-lamb, and therefore the opportunity which he sought was at last
found.

"I shall be leaving Noningsby to-morrow, Miss Staveley," he said one
day, having secured an interview in the back drawing-room--in that
happy half-hour which occurs in winter before the world betakes
itself to dress. Now I here profess my belief, that out of every
ten set offers made by ten young lovers, nine of such offers are
commenced with an intimation that the lover is going away. There is
a dash of melancholy in such tidings well suited to the occasion. If
there be any spark of love on the other side it will be elicited by
the idea of a separation. And then, also, it is so frequently the
actual fact. This making of an offer is in itself a hard piece of
business,--a job to be postponed from day to day. It is so postponed,
and thus that dash of melancholy, and that idea of separation are
brought in at the important moment with so much appropriate truth.

"I shall be leaving Noningsby to-morrow, Miss Staveley," Peregrine
said.

"Oh dear! we shall be so sorry. But why are you going? What will Mr.
Graham and Augustus do without you? You ought to stay at least till
Mr. Graham can leave his room."

"Poor Graham!--not that I think he is much to be pitied either; but
he won't be about for some weeks to come yet."

"You do not think he is worse; do you?"

"Oh, dear, no; not at all." And Peregrine was unconsciously irritated
against his friend by the regard which her tone evinced. "He is quite
well; only they will not let him be moved. But, Miss Staveley, it was
not of Mr. Graham that I was going to speak."

"No--only I thought he would miss you so much." And then she blushed,
though the blush in the dark of the evening was lost upon him. She
remembered that she was not to speak about Felix Graham's health, and
it almost seemed as though Mr. Orme had rebuked her for doing so in
saying that he had