them in the parlour.

"What a pretty girl!" said Shelton.

"Yes, she's a pretty girl; half the young fellows are after her, but she
won't leave her father. Oh, he 's a charming rascal is that fellow!"

This remark suddenly brought home to Shelton the conviction that he was
further than ever from avoiding the necessity for speaking. He walked
over to the window. The rain was coming down with fury, though a golden
line far down the sky promised the shower's quick end. "For goodness'
sake," he thought, "let me say something, however idiotic, and get it
over!" But he did not turn; a kind of paralysis had seized on him.

"Tremendous heavy rain!" he said at last; "coming down in waterspouts."

It would have been just as easy to say: "I believe your daughter to be
the sweetest thing on earth; I love her, and I 'm going to make her
happy!" Just as easy, just about the same amount of breath required; but
he couldn't say it! He watched the rain stream and hiss against the
leaves and churn the dust on the parched road with its insistent torrent;
and he noticed with precision all the details of the process going on
outside how the raindrops darted at the leaves like spears, and how the
leaves shook themselves free a hundred times a minute, while little
runnels of water, ice-clear, rolled over their edges, soft and quick. He
noticed, too, the mournful head of a sheltering cow that was chewing at
the hedge.

Mr. Dennant had not replied to his remark about the rain. So
disconcerting was this silence that Shelton turned. His future
father-in-law, upon his wooden chair, was staring at his well-blacked
boots, bending forward above his parted knees, and prodding at the
carpet; a glimpse at his face disturbed Shelton's resolution. It was not
forbidding, stern, discouraging--not in the least; it had merely for the
moment ceased to look satirical. This was so startling that Shelton lost
his chance of speaking. There seemed a heart to Mr. Dennant's gravity;
as though for once he were looking grave because he felt so. But
glancing up at Shelton, his dry jocosity reappeared at once.

"What a day for ducks!" he said; and again there was unmistakable alarm
about the eye. Was it possible that he, too, dreaded something?

"I can't express--" began Shelton hurriedly.

"Yes, it's beastly to get wet," said Mr. Dennant, and he sang--

"For we can wrestle and fight, my boys,
And jump out anywhere."

"You