Forced to be serious, fretted and hurried, for the half-hour bell before
dinner had now rung, and the dean's stomach began to know canonical hours,
he exclaimed, "The upshot of the whole business is, that Mr. Alfred Percy
is in love, I understand, with Miss Sophia Leicester, and this fifteen
hundred pounds, which he pushes me to the bare wall to relinquish, is
eventually, as part of her fortune, to become his. Would it not have been
as fair to have stated this at once?"

"No--because it would not have been the truth."

"No!--You won't deny that you are in love with Miss Leicester?"

"I am as much in love as man can be with Miss Leicester; but her fortune is
nothing to me, for I shall never touch it."

"Never touch it! Does the aunt--the widow--the cunning widow, refuse
consent?"

"Far from it: the aunt is all the aunt of Miss Leicester should be--all the
widow of Dr. Leicester ought to be. But her circumstances are not what they
ought to be; and by the liberality of a friend, who lends me a house, rent
free, and by the resources of my profession, I am better able than Mrs.
Leicester is to spare fifteen hundred pounds: therefore, in the recovery of
this money I have no personal interest at present. I shall never receive it
from her."

"Noble! Noble!--just what I could have done myself--once! What a contrast!"

Buckhurst laid his head down upon his arms flat on the table, and remained