This was all I think worth recording in the interview between Jael and Henry, except that at parting he thanked her warmly, and said, "May I give you one piece of advice in return? Mr. Richard Raby has fallen in love with you, and no wonder. If my heart was not full of Grace I should have fallen in love with you myself, you are so good and so beautiful; but he bears a bad character. You are wise in other people's affairs, pray don't be foolish in your own."
"Thank you," said Jael, a little dryly. "I shall think twice before I give my affections to any young man."
Henry had a word with his mother before he went, and begged her not to prepare disappointment for herself by trying to bring Jael and him together. "Besides, she has taken a spite against me. To be sure it is not very deep; for she gave me good advice; and I advised her not to throw herself away on Dissolute Dick."
Mrs. Little smiled knowingly and looked very much pleased, but she said nothing more just then. Henry Little returned to Hillsborough, and put his advertisement in "The Times" and the Hillsborough journals.
Two days afterward Ransome called on him with the "Hillsborough Liberal." "Is this yours?" said Ransome.
"Yes. I have reason to think she will write to me, if she sees it."
"Would you mind giving me your reason?"
Little gave it, but with so much reticence, that no other man in Hillsborough but Ransome would have understood.
"Hum!" said he, "I think I can do something with this." A period of expectation succeeded, hopeful at first, and full of excitement; but weeks rolled on without a word from the fugitive, and Little's heart sickened with hope deferred. He often wished to consult Jael Dence again; he had a superstitious belief in her sagacity. But the recollection of her cold manner deterred him. At last, however, impatience and the sense of desolation conquered, and he rode over to Raby Hall.
He found his uncle and his mother in the dining-room. Mr. Raby was walking about looking vexed, and even irritable.
The cause soon transpired. Dissolute Dick was at that moment in the drawing-room, making hot love to Jael Dence. He had wooed her ever since that fatal evening when she burst on society full-blown.
Raby, too proud and generous to forbid his addresses, had nevertheless been always bitterly averse to them, and was now in a downright rage; for Mrs. Little had just told him she felt sure he was actually proposing.
"Confound him!" said Henry, "and I wanted so to speak to her."
Raby gave him a most singular look, that struck him as odd at the time, and recurred to him afterward.
At last steps were heard overhead, and Dissolute Dick came down-stairs.
Mrs. Little slipped out, and soon after put her head into the dining-room to the gentlemen, and whispered to them "YES." Then she retired to talk it all over with Jael.
At that monosyllable Mr. Raby was very much discomposed.
"There goes a friend out of this house; more fools we. You have lost her by your confounded folly. What is the use spooning all your days after another man's wife? I wouldn't have had this happen for ten thousand pounds. Dissolute Dick! he will break her heart in a twelvemouth."
"Then why, in heaven's name, didn't you marry her yourself?"