"Wait one moment while I tell you why I speak. I do not think you are doing quite the right thing by Miss Fauntleroy, in thus, as it were, trifling with her. She expects you to propose to her, and you are keeping her in suspense unwarrantably long. You should either make her an offer, or let it be unmistakably known that there exists no such intention on your part. It would be a good thing in all ways, if you can only make up your mind to it; but do as you please: _I_ do not urge you either way." "I may as well do it," muttered Travice to himself. "_She_ has chosen another, and it little matters what becomes of me: look which way I will, there's nothing but darkness. As well go through life with Bab Fauntleroy at my side, like an incubus, as go through it without her." And Travice Arkell--as if he feared his resolution might desert him--went out forthwith and offered himself to Miss Fauntleroy. Never, surely, did any similar proposal betray so much _hauteur_, so much indifference, so little courtesy in the offering. Barbara happened to be alone; she was sitting in a white muslin dress, looking as big as a house, and waiting in state for any visitors who might call. He spoke out immediately. She probably knew, he said, that he was a sort of bankrupt in self, purse, and heart; little worth the acceptance of any one; but if she would like to take him, such as he was, he would try and do his duty by her. The offer was really couched in those terms; and he did not take shame to himself as he spoke them. Travice Arkell _could_ not be a hypocrite: he knew that the girl was aware of the state of things and of his indifference; he believed she saw through his love for Lucy; and he hated her with a sort of resentful hatred for having fixed her liking and her hopes upon him. He had been an indulged son all his life--a sort of fortune's pet--and the turn that things had taken was an awful blow. "Will she say she'll have me?" he thought as he concluded. "I don't believe any other woman would." But Barbara Fauntleroy did say she would have him; and she put out her hand to him in her hearty good-natured way, and told him she thought they should get on very well together when once they had "shaken down." Travice touched the hand; he shook it in a gingerly manner, and then dropped it; but he never kissed her--he never said a warmer word than "thank you." Perhaps Miss Fauntleroy did not look for it: sentiment is little understood by these matter-of-fact, unrefined natures, with their loud voices, and their demonstrative temperaments. Travice would have to kiss her some time, he supposed; but he was content to put off the evil until that time came. "How odd that you should have come and made me an offer this morning, Mr. Travice," she said, with a laugh. "Lizzie has just had one."