"
"And the father, who is as keen to see the match concluded as ever I
have been to win a main?"
"Ay," said Bucklaw, in the same disparaging manner, "it lies with Sir
William's policy to secure the next best match, since he cannot barter
his child to save the great Ravenswood estate, which the English House
of Lords are about to wrench out of his clutches."
"What say you to the young lady herself?" said Craigengelt; "the finest
young woman in all Scotland, one that you used to be so fond of when she
was cross, and now she consents to have you, and gives up her engagement
with Ravenswood, you are for jibbing. I must say, the devil's in ye,
when ye neither know what you would have nor what you would want."
"I'll tell you my meaning in a word," answered Bucklaw, getting up and
walking through the room; "I want to know what the devil is the cause of
Miss Ashton's changing her mind so suddenly?"
"And what need you care," said Craigengelt, "since the change is in your
favour?"
"I'll tell you what it is," returned his patron, "I never knew much of
that sort of fine ladies, and I believe they may be as capricious as the
devil; but there is something in Miss Ashton's change a devilish deal
too sudden and too serious for a mere flisk of her own.
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