That settled Senator Pope’s aristocratic ambitions.
“I’ve come, sir,” Frothingham was saying, “to ask your consent to marrying your daughter.”
Senator Pope’s eyes swam, so strong was his emotion. “I am highly honoured, Lord Frothingham. But I cannot give you an answer in so important a matter at once. I must consult with her mother.” Mrs. Pope was a shadowy nonentity, flitting nervously in the wake of father and daughter.
He detained Frothingham for a long talk on England and America, and sent him away in an almost jubilant mood--no applicant ever left him downcast. The next day Frothingham got a telegram from Elsie asking him to come to her as soon as he could. He assumed that her father had decided to convey his consent through her, and his spirits rose higher. But the first glimpse of her disturbed him--hers was not the face of a bearer of good news.
“Yes,” she interrupted. “He has written me.”
“Yes and no.” She hesitated. “He asked me not to tell, but I know I can trust you. He has been planning to be nominated for Vice-President. And he has found that he can’t have the nomination if I marry a titled foreigner--especially an Englishman, because of the Irish. They say it would kill the ticket.”
Frothingham retreated behind a vacant look.
“He found it out only a few days ago.” She did not feel equal to telling him that her father had learned this fatal fact through the exposure of Rontivogli. “So,” she ended, “we couldn’t marry until after the election. For he says he’s sure of the nomination.”
Fortunately Frothingham had not the habit of letting his face speak for him. After a pause he said: “But surely you can persuade him.”
“It’s useless to try. You don’t know him as I do. He seems yielding, and usually he is. But where he’s set he’s hard as granite.”
“Nearly two years,” he repeated. And to himself: “Impossible! I might weather six months, but two years--the creditors would laugh at me.”
“And I wish to go away at once,” she said with a long sigh, looking at him mournfully.
“I--we--can’t wait two years,” he replied.
“We needn’t, need we? We might----” she began, then halted, blushing vividly.
He pretended not to understand--though he did, for he had already thought of that plan.