Sir Charles pooh-poohed this view, and the two friends were sharp with one another in discussing it.

After dinner, when the ladies had left them, Sir Charles, repentant and cordial, urged Erskine to speak to Gertrude without troubling himself as to the sincerity of Trefusis.

But Erskine, knowing himself ill able to brook a refusal, was loth to expose himself.
"If you had heard the tone of her voice when she asked him whether he was in earnest, you would not talk to me like this," he said despondently.

"I wish he had never come here." "Well, that, at least, was no fault of mine, my dear fellow," said Sir Charles.

"He came among us against my will.