The Woman with One Hand, and Mr. Ely's Engagement

"Third time of asking!"

Mr. Ely got up. He looked very cross indeed. Pompey snarled. That faithful animal seemed to scent battle in the air.

"Well, I'm-hanged!"

We fear that Mr. Ely would have preferred another termination, but he contented himself with "hanged." Miss Truscott looked up. She allowed her long, sweeping eyelashes gradually to unveil her eyes. She regarded Mr. Ely with a look of the sweetest, most innocent surprise.

"Mr. Ely! Whatever is there wrong?"

Mr. Ely was obliged to take a step or two before he could trust himself to speak. As he was sufficiently warm already the exercise did not tend to make him cool. Under the circumstances, he showed a considerable amount of courage in coming to the point with a rush.

"Miss Truscott, I want a wife!"

"You want a what?"

"A wife! Don't I say it plain enough? I want a wife!"

"I see. You want a wife." With her calmest, coolest air Miss Truscott continued stroking Pompey's head. "Did you notice how they are wearing the hats in town?"

Mr. Ely sprang-literally sprang! – about an inch and a half from the ground. "What the dickens do I know about the hats in town?"

"Mr. Ely! How excited you do get! I thought everybody knew about the hats in town-I mean, whether they wear them on the right side or the left."

Mr. Ely was not an excitable man as a rule, but he certainly did seem excited now. His handkerchief, which he had kept in his hand since the commencement of the interview, he had kneaded into a little ball which was hard as stone.

"Miss Truscott, I'll-I'll give a sovereign to any charity you like to name if you'll stick to the point for just two minutes."

"Hand over the sovereign!"

Mr. Ely was taken aback. Miss Truscott held out her small, white hand with a promptitude which surprised him.

"I-I said that I would give a sovereign to any charity you like to name if you'll stick to the point for just two minutes."

"Cash in advance, and I'll keep to any point you like to name for ten."

Mr. Ely was doubtful. Miss Truscott looked at him with eyes which were wide enough open now. Her hand was unflinchingly held out. Mr. Ely felt in the recesses of his waistcoat pocket. He produced a sovereign purse, and from this sovereign purse he produced a coin.

"It's the first time I ever heard of a man having to pay a sovereign to ask a woman to be his wife!"

"Hand over the sovereign!" She became possessed of the golden coin. "This sovereign will be applied to the charitable purpose of erecting a monument over Pompey's mother's grave. Now, Mr. Ely, I'm your man."

Mr. Ely seemed a little subdued. The business-like way in which he had been taken at his word perhaps caused him to feel a certain respect for the lady's character. He reseated himself in the garden-chair.

"I've already said that I want a wife."

"Do you wish me to find you one? I can introduce you to several of my friends. I know a young lady in the village, aged about thirty-eight, who has an impediment in her speech, who would make an excellent companion for your more silent hours."

"The wife I want is you."

"That is very good of you, I'm sure."

There was a pause. The lady, with a little smile, tranquilly tickled Pompey with the sovereign she had earned. The gentleman fidgeted with his handkerchief.

"Well, Miss Truscott, am I to be gratified?"

"Why do you want me? Won't some one else do as well?"

Immediately the gentleman became a little rose.

"May I ask you for an answer to my question?"

"You haven't asked me a question yet."

"Will you be my wife?"

The question was put in a rather louder key than, in such cases, is understood to be the rule. Miss Truscott raised her head, and for some moments kept her glance fixed upon the gentleman, as though she were trying to read something in his face. Then she lowered her glance and made answer thus-

"Frankly-you say you are a business man-let us, as you suggest, understand each other in a business kind of way. In asking me to be your wife, you are not asking for-love?"

As she spoke of love her lips gave just the tiniest twitch.

"I believe that a wife is supposed to love her husband-as a rule."

"In your creed love comes after marriage?"

"At this present moment I'm asking you to be my wife."

"That's exactly what I understand. You're not even making a pretence of loving me?"

"Miss Truscott, as you put it, I'm a business man. I have money, you have money-"

"Let's put the lot together and make a pile. Really, that's not a bad idea on the whole." It was the young lady who gave this rather unexpected conclusion to his sentence. Then she looked at him steadily with those great eyes of hers, whose meaning for the life of him he could not understand. "I suppose that all you want from me is 'Yes'; and that in complete indifference as to whether I like you or do not?"

"If you didn't like me you wouldn't be sitting here."

"Really, that's not a bad idea again. You arrive at rapid conclusions in your own peculiar way. I suppose if I told you that I could like a man-love him better than my life-you would not understand."

"That sort of thing is not my line. I'm not a sentimental kind of man. I say a thing and mean a thing and when I say I'll do a thing it's just as good as done."

"Then all you want me to be is-Mrs. Ely?"

"What else do you suppose I want you to be? It's amazing how even the most sensible women like to beat about the bush. Here have I asked you a good five minutes to be my wife, and you're just coming to the point. Why can't you say right out-Yes or No."

Miss Truscott shrugged her shoulders.

"I suppose it doesn't matter?"

"What doesn't matter?"