I'm going to see a parson. Run
upstairs and play with your dolls, and if you're a good girl, I'll bring
you in some sweets." He put on his hat, and closing the front door with
a bang, went off to the new rector to knock two years off the age which
his daughter kept for purposes of matrimony. The rector, grieved at such
duplicity in one so young, met him more than half way, and he came out
from him smiling placidly, until his attention was attracted by a young
man on the other side of the road, who was regarding him with manifest
awkwardness.
"Good evening, Captain Polson," he said, crossing the road.
"Oh," said the captain, stopping, "I wanted to speak to you. I suppose
you wanted to marry my daughter while I was out of the way, to save
trouble. Just the manly thing I should have expected of you. I've
stopped the banns, and I'm going to take her for a voyage with me.
You'll have to look elsewhere, my lad."
"The ill feeling is all on your side, captain," said Metcalfe,
reddening.
"Ill feeling!" snorted the captain. "You put me in the witness-box, and
made me a laughing-stock in the place with your silly attempts at jokes,
lost me five hundred pounds, and then try and marry my daughter while
I'm at sea. Ill feeling be hanged!"
"That was business," said the other.
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