'Exactly so,' said Ben. 'She has it when she comes of age, or
marries. She wants a year of coming of age, and if you plucked
up a spirit she needn't want a month of being married.'
'She's a very charming and delightful creature,' quoth Mr.
Robert Sawyer, in reply; 'and has only one fault that I know of,
Ben. It happens, unfortunately, that that single blemish is a want
of taste. She don't like me.'
'It's my opinion that she don't know what she does like,' said
Mr. Ben Allen contemptuously.
'Perhaps not,' remarked Mr. Bob Sawyer. 'But it's my opinion
that she does know what she doesn't like, and that's of more importance.'
'I wish,' said Mr. Ben Allen, setting his teeth together, and
speaking more like a savage warrior who fed on raw wolf's flesh
which he carved with his fingers, than a peaceable young gentleman
who ate minced veal with a knife and fork--'I wish I knew
whether any rascal really has been tampering with her, and
attempting to engage her affections. I think I should assassinate
him, Bob.'
'I'd put a bullet in him, if I found him out,' said Mr. Sawyer,
stopping in the course of a long draught of beer, and looking
malignantly out of the porter pot.
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