fact be known. "Shall we wait for him, my dear; he is usually so uncertain
and late?"

"Yet a very important man," put in Bulstrode, "as being entitled to lead
the lady of the house to the table, in virtue of his birthright. So much
for being the fourth son of an Irish baron! Do you know Harris's father has
just been ennobled?"

This was news to the company; and it evidently much increased the doubts of
the propriety of sitting down without the young man in question.

"Failing of this son of a new Irish baron, I suppose you fancy I shall be
obliged to give my hand to the eldest son of an English baronet," said
Anneke, smiling, so as to take off the edge of a little irony that I fancy
just glimmered in her manner.

"I wish to Heaven you _would_, Anne Mordaunt," whispered Bulstrode, loud
enough for me to hear him, "so that the heart were its companion!"

I thought this both bold and decided; and I looked anxiously at Anneke,
to note the effect; but she evidently received it as trifling, certainly
betraying no emotion at a speech I thought so pointed. I wished she had
manifested a little resentment. Then she was so very young to be thus
importuned!

"Dinner had better be served, sir," she calmly observed to her father. "Mr.
Harris is apt to think himself ill-treated if he do not find everybody at
table. It would be a sign his watch was wrong, and that he had come half an
hour too soon."