For many a year he
had had at his command florid and extravagant figures of speech which,
cast in any one of a dozen of his dulcet modulations of voice, were
warranted to tell on even the most stubborn masculine intelligence,
and ought to have melted the feminine heart at the moment of
utterance, but at this particular moment they all failed him, and he
was left high and dry on the coast of courtship with only the bare
question available for use.
"Miss Rose Mary," he blurted out without any preamble at all, and
drops of the sweat of an agony of anxiety stood out all over the wide
brow, "I have been talking with Mr. Alloway, and I have come to you to
see if we can't all get together and settle this mortgage question to
the profit of all concerned. I lent him that money six years ago with
the intention of trying to get you to be my wife just as soon as you
recovered from your--your natural grief over the way things had gone
with you and young Alloway. I have waited longer than I had any
intention of doing, because I was absorbed in this political career I
had begun on, but now I see it is time to settle matters, as the farm
is running us all into debt, and I'm very much in need of you as a
wife. I hope you see it in that light, and the marriage can't take
place too soon to suit me. You are the handsomest woman in my
district, and my constituents can not help but approve of my choice."
Something of the Senator's grandiloquence was returning to him, and he
regarded Rose Mary with the pride of one who has appraised
satisfactorily and is about to complete a proposed purchase.
Pages:
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155