His Grace — page 211: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

HIS GRACE. 205 * wished to retain it, I should not be able to do so much longer, because Hurstbourne’s affairs must soon be placed in the hands of trustees. I proposed to take a small house somewhere on the outskirts of London, while looking about for some fresh field in which to employ my energies, and I added that Nora would have to make her home with me until she married. I went on to state that I did not ask her consent to this arrange- ment, seeing that I held myself justified in issuing commands upon the point, and she seemed to be much amused by the peremptory tone in which I informed her that I should permit no matrimonial alliance on her part, save one of affection. | “Poor old Phil!” she said; ‘ how do you suppose that you can prevent me from accepting the first benev- olent old gentleman who asks me? ‘Twoof them have already honored me by offers. I seem destined to captivate elderly admirers.” “But you have refused them?” I said apprehen- Sively. “Oh, yes; I have refused them both—more shame forme! Nothing is so immoral or so deteriorating as to make resolutions and then break them for want of a pinch of courage. But never mind me just now; my prospects can be discussed any day during the next two or three months, and so can yours. We have no time to lose, though, if we want to preserve the duke from 2 Her sentence was interrupted by the abrupt throwing open of the drawing-room door and the entrance of two persons who were apparently in the midst of a heated altercation. Through the apertures of the carved screen I could see Miss St. George in her riding-habit and the Gomichboo (9) cS (Elo)