The Impostor Part 45

"I am glad you mentioned that, sir, because I purpose staying at Silverdale now," he said. "It leads up to what I have to ask you."

Barrington's perceptions seemed to grow clearer, and he asked a few pertinent questions before he nodded approbation.

"Yes," he said, "she is a good girl--a very good girl, and it would be a suitable match. I should like somebody to send for her."

Maud Barrington came in softly, with a little glow in her eyes and a flush in her face, and Barrington smiled at her.

"My dear, I am very pleased, and I wish you every happiness," he said.

"Once I would scarcely have trusted you to Lance, but he will forgive me, and has shown me that I was wrong. You and he will make Silverdale famous, and it is comforting to know, now my rest is very near, that you have chosen a man of your own station to follow me. With all our faults and blunders, blood is bound to tell."

Witham saw that Miss Barrington's eyes were a trifle misty, and he felt his face grow hot, but the girl's fingers touched his arm, and he followed, when, while her aunt signed approbation, she led him away.

Then, when they stood outside she laid her hands upon his face and drew it down to her.

"You will forget it, dear, and he is still wrong. If you had been Lance Courthorne, I should never have done this," she said.

"No," said the man gravely. "I think there are many ways in which he is right, but you can be content with Witham the prairie farmer?"

Maud Barrington drew closer to him with a little smile in her eyes.

"Yes," she said simply. "There never was a Courthorne who could stand beside him."