"It don't give one much trouble following him into his arguments." Mr Crosbie perhaps found the difficulty greater than did Mrs Hearn, and would have devoted his mind more perfectly to the discourse had the argument been deeper.

It is very hard, that necessity of listening to a man who says nothing.
On this occasion Crosbie ignored the necessity altogether, and gave up his mind to the consideration of what it might be expedient that he should say to Lily before he went.

He remembered well those few words which he had spoken in the first ardour of his love, pleading that an early day might be fixed for their marriage.

And he remembered, also, how prettily Lily had yielded to him.

"Only do not let it be too soon," she had said.