"Well, I will tell you the truth, Maurice," he blurted out, at last. "I
got engaged to her in a fit of restlessness or caprice, or some such
ridiculous nonsense, and I don't regret it; I mean, I am willing to
stand by it; but that is not enough for her, and I can look forward to
nothing but a perpetual series of differences and quarrels. She expects
me to play Harry Thornhill off the stage, I suppose."
Mangan looked at him for some time.
"Even between friends," he said, slowly, "there are some things it is
difficult to talk about with safety. Of course you know what an outsider
would say: that you had got into a devil of a mess; that you had
blundered into an engagement with a woman whom you find you don't want
to marry."
"Well, is there anything uncommon in that?" Lionel demanded. "Is that
an unusual experience in human life? But I don't admit as much, in my
case. I am quite willing to marry her, so long as she keeps her temper,
and doesn't expect me to play the fool. I dare say we shall get on well
enough, like other people, after the fateful deed is done. In the
meantime," he added, with a forced laugh--"in the meantime, I find
myself now and again wishing I was a sailor brave and bold, careering
round the Cape of Good Hope in a gale of wind, and with no loftier
aspiration in my mind than a pint of rum and a well-filled pipe.
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