But, of course, if you----. Let me
think. Do you drink, sir?"
"No."
Mr. Teal sighed. Roland could not help feeling that he was
disappointing the old man a good deal.
"You do not, I suppose, chance to have a past?" asked Mr. Teal, not
very hopefully. "I use the word in its technical sense. A deserted
wife? Some poor creature you have treated shamefully?"
At the risk of sinking still further in the butler's esteem, Roland was
compelled to answer in the negative.
"I was afraid not," said Mr. Teal, shaking his head. "Thinking it all
over yesterday, I said to myself, 'I'm afraid he wouldn't have one.'
You don't look like the sort of gentleman who had done much with his
time."
"Thinking it over?"
"Not on your account, sir," explained Mr. Teal. "On the family's. I
disapproved of this match from the first. A man who has served a family
as long as I have had the honor of serving his lordship's, comes to
entertain a high regard for the family prestige. And, with no offense
to yourself, sir, this would not have done."
"Well, it looks as if it would have to do," said Roland, gloomily. "I
can't see any way out of it.
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