Ralph departed first; then
Florence. Then Balsamo gathered up the sovereigns. He had honestly
earned Adam's fiver, and since Ralph had refused the two pounds--"I have
seen their hands," said Balsamo the next day to Adam Tellwright. "All is
clear. In a month you will be engaged to her."
"A month?"
"A month. I regret that I had a painful scene with your rival. But of
course professional etiquette prevents me from speaking of that. Let me
repeat, in a month you will be engaged to her."
This prophecy came true. Adam Tellwright, however, did not marry
Florence Bostock. One evening, in a secluded corner at a dance, Ralph
Martin, without warning, threw his arms angrily, brutally, instinctively
round Florence's neck and kissed her. It was wrong of him. But he
conquered her. Love is like that. It hides for years, and then pops out,
and won't be denied. Florence's engagement to Adam was broken. She
married Ralph. She knew she was marrying a strange, dark-minded man of
uncertain temper, but she married him.
As for the unimpeachable Adam, he was left with nothing but the uneasy
fear that he was doomed to die at fifty-two.
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