"You may say what you like; you will be a _parti_," Mrs. Gosselin continued. "Well, then, if the worst comes to the worst I shall do what I said just now: I shall get some good plausible girl to see me through." "The proper way to 'get' her will be to marry her. After you're married you won't be a _parti_." "Dear mamma, he'll think you're already levelling your rifle!" Mary Gosselin laughingly wailed. Guy Firminger looked at her a moment. "I say, Mary, wouldn't _you_ do?" "For the good plausible girl? Should I be plausible enough?" "Surely--what could be more natural? Everything would seem to contribute to the suitability of our alliance. I should be known to have known you for years--from childhood's sunny hour; I should be known to have bullied you, and even to have been bullied _by_ you, in the period of pinafores. My relations from a tender age with your brother, which led to our schoolroom romps in holidays and to the happy footing on which your mother has always been so good as to receive me here, would add to all the presumptions of intimacy. People would accept such a conclusion as inevitable." "Among all your reasons you don't mention the young lady's attractions," said Mary Gosselin. Firminger stared a moment, his clear eye lighted by his happy thought. "I don't mention the young man's. They would be so obvious, on one side and the other, as to be taken for granted." "And is it your idea that one should pretend to be engaged to you all one's life?" "Oh no, simply till I should have had time to look round. I'm determined not to be hustled and bewildered into matrimony--to be dragged to the shambles before I know where I am. With such an arrangement as the one I speak of I should be able to take my time, to keep my head, to make my choice." "And how would the young lady make hers?" "How do you mean, hers?" "The selfishness of men is something exquisite. Suppose the young lady--if it's conceivable that you should find one idiotic enough to be a party to such a transaction--suppose the poor girl herself should happen to wish to be _really_ engaged?" Guy Firminger thought a moment, with his slow but not stupid smile. "Do you mean to _me_?" "To you--or to some one else." "Oh, if she'd give me notice I'd let her off." "Let her off till you could find a substitute?" "Yes--but I confess it would be a great inconvenience. People wouldn't take the second one so seriously." "She would have to make a sacrifice; she would have to wait till you should know where you were," Mrs. Gosselin suggested. "Yes, but where would _her_ advantage come in?" Mary persisted. "Only in the pleasure of charity; the moral satisfaction of doing a fellow a good turn," said Firminger. "You must think people are keen to oblige you!" "Ah, but surely I could count on _you_, couldn't I?" the young man asked.