CHAPTER XXIV.
'Well, Albinia,' said Mr. Kendal, after seeing Mr. Dusautoy on his
return from London.
There was such a look of deprecation about him, that she exclaimed,
'One would really think you had been accepting this charming son-in-law.'
'Suppose I had,' he said, rather quaintly; then, as he saw her hands
held up, 'conditionally, you understand, entirely conditionally.
What could I do, when Dusautoy entreated me, with tears in his eyes,
not to deprive him of the only chance of saving his nephew?'
'Umph,' was the most innocent sound Albinia could persuade herself to
make.
'Besides,' continued Mr. Kendal, 'it will be better to have the
affair open and avowed than to have all this secret plotting going on
without being able to prevent it. I can always withhold my consent
if he should not improve, and Dusautoy declares nothing would be such
an incentive.'
'May it prove so!'
'You see,' he pursued, 'as his uncle says, nothing can be worse than
driving him to these resorts, and when he is once of age, there's an
end of all power over him to hinder his running straight to ruin.
Now, when he is living at the Vicarage, we shall have far more
opportunity of knowing how he is going on, and putting a check on
their intercourse, if he be unsatisfactory.'
'If we can.'
'After all, the young man has done nothing that need blight his
future life. He has had great disadvantages, and his steady
attachment is much in his favour.
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