“Yes, I have my duties,” said the lover, in his insolent happiness turning a beaming countenance upon the unsuccessful one. It was growing dark, and he was so impertinent as to give a little twitch to Nelly’s sleeve in the obscurity, under Major Railton’s very eyes; who did not, indeed, see this flaunting in his face of his adversary’s banner, but felt that there was some bond unrevealed which joined the three before him in a common cause. He went away in a state of irritation for which he could not have given any just reason, and tore the plumber’s estimate to pieces when he emerged from the shrubbery in front of The Elms. Mrs. Eastwood had not taken kindly even to his plumber. She had stood by a certain old Sclater, an old jobbing Scotsman, for whom she had a national partiality. “Why should I bother myself about their concerns? Let them get Molyneux to look after things,” the Major said to himself, with scorn that transcended all other expression; and he laughed what is sometimes described in literature as a “hollow laugh” of bitterness and sarcasm. Indeed, I think Major Railton was right, and that Molyneux’s supervision of the roofs and water-butts would have come to very little good. It had been resolved in the family that nothing was to be said about the engagement for the present, as it would in all probability be a long one; and this was how they began to carry out their resolution. I do not need to add that the servants knew it the first evening, and had already settled where the young people were to live, and what sort of an establishment they would keep up. Winks, too, was aware of the fact from the first, and, as I have said, was confidentially humorous about it with Nelly, and kept up her courage during the interview between her mother and her lover. But notwithstanding all we have been hearing lately about the communications made by dogs to their friends, I do not think he spread the news out of doors, or if he did whisper it to a crony, that crony was discreet.