"She is a girl without a penny," answered Solomon, gloomily, with a
scowl at his son, "upon whom this young fool wishes to throw himself
away."
"What! so early?" observed Mr. Balfour, good-humoredly addressing
Charles. "When I was your age, I thought of enjoying life, and not of
marriage. I don't wonder, however, that any girl should strive to
enslave so handsome a young fellow as your son, Sir. It is quite
natural, and there is no need to blame her, and far less _him_."
Ashamed, perhaps, of having exhibited such violence of temper before his
guest, Solomon was very willing to be mollified, and grimly smiled
approval of these sentiments; Charles, too, though fully resolved to set
himself right with Agnes on the morrow, was not displeased with the
visitor's remark; but the two women justly resented it as an impertinent
freedom. If Charles's thoughts had not been so preoccupied with his own
wrongs--the deprivation of his Agnes's society, which he had promised
himself for the rest of the day, and the snub which he conceived she had
administered to him--he would have noticed too, for he was by no means
wanting in observation, that the new-comer's manner to his hostess and
Mrs. Basil was not what it should have been. It was not absolutely rude,
but it was studiously careless of their presence.
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