‘Any place you please, sir.’ ‘My friend Mr. Prior will marry us.’ ‘Any parson you have a mind for, sir.’ Meadowes drew Anne closer to him, and kissed her lovely tear-stained face. Then he bade her good-bye, and she went into the cottage and sat there face to face with life, as every woman is when she makes up her mind on what now-a-days we term the Marriage Problem. Anne was very clear-sighted; she saw, as every woman with her wits about her must see, that it is not good for woman—especially pretty woman—to be alone. She saw in ‘Dick Sundon,’ as she called him, a protector whom she had every reason to like. In the bitterness of her heart she had vowed never to trust any man again, but she must have had some vague feeling of confidence in this kindly bright-eyed suitor, else Anne would have hesitated more than she did before coming to her decision. She had hitherto been rather suspicious of the attentions of ‘fine gentlemen,’ as she termed them, but this offer of marriage seemed honourable to a degree. ‘I’ll never forget Sebastian—not for all he hath done by me—but mayhap I’d be happier wedded to Dick Sundon than living alone all my days. Oh, he’s kind enough for certain, an’ free with his money, and now he do wish to marry me what better can I do?’ she asked herself. Unanswerable arguments. Meadowes, on his part, went home profoundly miserable. For the sinner who would sin enjoyably must be of another stuff from that of which this man was made. Just as he had achieved success, his heart turned with a perfectly genuine emotion of pity towards the woman he had deceived so cruelly. Yet on he went. That evening he called upon his friend Mr. Simon Prior, at his rooms in Piccadilly. ‘A somewhat late visitor, I fear, Prior,’ he said. ‘Never too late to be welcome,’ said Prior. ‘Well, I am come on business, which must be my excuse,’ said Meadowes. He sat down, and Prior waited to hear what the business might be. ‘The fact is, I wish you to do me a favour,—I wish your assistance to the carrying out of—of an affair of some delicacy.’ ‘I shall be delighted; but I find it difficult to imagine . . . my money affairs,’ . . . began Prior, whose one idea of a difficulty was money. ‘I had best make a long story short,’ said Meadowes, ‘I want you to act cleric for me; I’ve seen your powers of mimicry ere this, and I swear you’d play the parson to a nicety.’ ‘Phew!’ whistled Prior. ‘So ’tis a woman is the difficulty; but why, Meadowes, if I may intrude upon your secrets, why do you demand a parson?’ ‘Ah! there is my difficulty. There are women, you see, who value their good name, and this woman is of the number. ’Tis unfortunate, but a fact I cannot get over. She hath promised to be my wife, however, and I have explained to her that family reasons make a private marriage necessary at present. I trusted to you for the rest of it.’ Simon Prior leant back in his chair and eyed his visitor narrowly.