'Please not to interrupt me thus. I mean that you must not be prejudiced against her as an expected_ parti_.' 'Why should I?' 'One hears and reads so much of such things.' 'In novels, I suppose; but as she is so pretty and eligible, why the dickens----' 'Shafto!' 'What now?' he asked, with some irritability, as she often took him to task for his solecisms. 'Dickens is not a phrase to use. Exclamations that were suited to the atmosphere of Mr. Carlyon's office in Devonshire will not do in Craigengowan!' 'Well--she won't look at me with your eyes, grandmother.' 'How--her eyes----' 'They will never seem so bright and beautiful.' 'Oh, you flattering pet!' exclaimed my Lady Fettercairn, with a smile and pleased flush on her old wrinkled face, for her 'pet' had soon discovered that she was far from insensible to adulation. Shafto certainly availed himself of the opportunities afforded by 'cousinship,' propinquity, and residence together in a country house, and sought to gain a place in the good graces or heart of Finella; but with all his cunning and earnest wishes in the matter--apart from the wonderful beauty of the girl--he feared that he made no more progress with her than he had done with Dulcie Carlyon. She talked, played, danced, and even romped with him; they rambled and read together, and were as much companions as any two lovers would be; but he felt nearly certain that though she flirted with him, because it was partly her habit to appear to do so with most men, whenever he attempted to become tender she openly laughed at him or changed the subject skilfully; and also that if he essayed to touch or take her hand it was very deliberately withdrawn from his reach, and never did she make him more sensible of all this than when he contrived to draw her aside to the terrace on the afternoon of the lawn-tennis party. She had long ere this been made perfectly aware that love and marriage were objects of all his attention, yet she amused herself with him by her coquettish _œillades_ and waggish speeches. 'Finella,' said he, in a low and hesitating voice, as he stooped over her, 'I hope that with all your flouting, and pretty, flippant mode of treating me, you will see your way to carry out the fondest desire of my heart and that of our grandparents.' 'Such a fearfully elaborate speech! And the object to which I am to see my way is to marry you, cousin Shafto?' 'Yes,' said he, bending nearer to her half-averted ear. 'Thanks very much, dear Shafto; but I couldn't think of such a thing.' 'Why? Am I so distasteful to you?' 'Not at all; but for cogent reasons of my own.' 'And these are?' 'Firstly, people should marry to please themselves, not others. Grandpapa and grandmamma did, and so shall I; and I am quite independent enough to do as I please and choose.' 'In short, you will not or cannot love me?'