Restored by the stimulant, and encouraged by the readiness with which
the captain anticipated everything that he had to say, Noel Vanstone
contrived to state the serious object of his visit in tolerably plain
terms. All the conventional preliminaries proper to the occasion were
easily disposed of. The suitor's family was respectable; his position
in life was undeniably satisfactory; his attachment, though hasty, was
evidently disinterested and sincere. All that Captain Wragge had to
do was to refer to these various considerations with a happy choice of
language in a voice that trembled with manly emotion, and this he did
to perfection. For the first half-hour of the interview, no allusion
whatever was made to the delicate and dangerous part of the subject. The
captain waited until he had composed his visitor, and when that result
was achieved came smoothly to the point in these terms:
"There is one little difficulty, Mr. Vanstone, which I think we have
both overlooked. Your housekeeper's recent conduct inclines me to fear
that she will view the approaching change in your life with anything but
a friendly eye. Probably you have not thought it necessary yet to inform
her of the new tie which you propose to form?"
Noel Vanstone turned pale at the bare idea of explaining himself to Mrs.
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