They appeared to her to be so clean run and so safe. They were
indeed so clean run that, in a faint sort of way, Edward seems to
have regarded them rather as boys than as girls. And then, one
evening, Mrs Ashburnham had with her boy one of those
conversations that English mothers have with English sons. It
seems to have been a criminal sort of proceeding, though I don't
know what took place at it. Anyhow, next morning Colonel
Ashburnham asked on behalf of his son for the hand of Leonora.
This caused some consternation to the Powys couple, since
Leonora was the third daughter and Edward ought to have married
the eldest. Mrs Powys, with her rigid sense of the proprieties,
almost wished to reject the proposal. But the Colonel, her
husband, pointed out that the visit would have cost them sixty
pounds, what with the hire of an extra servant, of a horse and car,
and with the purchase of beds and bedding and extra tablecloths.
There was nothing else for it but the marriage. In that way Edward
and Leonora became man and wife.
I don't know that a very minute study of their progress towards
complete disunion is necessary. Perhaps it is. But there are many
things that I cannot well make out, about which I cannot well
question Leonora, or about which Edward did not tell me.
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