“You told me I should never marry him with your consent!” cried Conny. “And you haven’t!” broke in my aunt. “Good God!” shouted my uncle. “Isn’t the thing over? what’s the use of wrangling? what’s the use of snapping at each other like that?” “No use at all,” said I. “And what’s more--though I’m a heretic for saying so--in my opinion a woman has a perfect right to choose for herself the man that the law compels her to live with.” “Shame! shame!” groaned my aunt. “You can’t mean what you say. Aren’t you, too, grossly deceived?” “No!” interrupted Conny, a sudden blush dyeing her face scarlet. “Charlie knew that I didn’t--that I couldn’t love him--greatly as I liked him.” Oh! I thought, if you weren’t a young bride, if it weren’t incumbent upon me to respect your feelings, if it wouldn’t be unmanly to deliver myself of my sentiments, _how_ I could make you writhe. But I’ll spare thee, Conny, which I could not do, had I truly loved thee. “Conny’s quite right,” said I aloud, “she never gave me any encouragement, she always told me she only liked me. I was very impertinent to dare to have any hopes.” She turned a look of triumph on her Theodore. Come, I was a sore point anyhow, which was better than being nothing at all. “Why _must_ we be personal?” cried my uncle. “What _are_ we to talk about if we mayn’t speak of this aw--this dread--this--this--thing?” sobbed my aunt. “Well, you must excuse me for taking Charlie into the library,” said he, rising and laying hold of my arm. “I have many questions to ask him about the bank.” Mr. Curling looked at us as if he should cry out, “For the love of heaven, don’t leave me!” But my uncle took no notice, and hurriedly walked me out of the room, not even giving me time to make a bow to the happy trio I left behind. “I am sick of these squabbles!” he exclaimed, lighting a candle in the library and flinging himself into an arm-chair. “Sick of these personalities, hints, innuendos, and aspersions. Oh for the wings of a dove! Why can’t my wife leave them alone? My word is pledged to them, and she knows it, but is for ever bursting into our sense of honour with sharp charges and reckless attacks.” “It was to be expected,” said I; “but give her time, and she will become inured to the new state of things.” “So far as the comfort of my home is concerned, these rows can’t last longer than to-night. To-morrow Curling takes his wife into lodgings.” “Small blame to him. He is really to be pitied. I have heard that mothers-in-law are bad enough company to live with, even when they have graced the marriage service with their consenting presence, and sobbed over the bridegroom’s impossible promises. But what they are when their daughters are married in defiance of them, I can only dimly and fearfully guess.”