Her uncle was fond of Miss Dunstable; but she was sure that an idea
of such a marriage had never entered his head; that it would be very
difficult--almost impossible--to create such an idea; and that if the
idea were there, the doctor could hardly be instigated to make the
proposition. Looking at the matter as a whole, she feared that the
match was not practicable.
On the day of Miss Dunstable's party, Mrs. Gresham and her uncle
dined together alone in Portman Square. Mr. Gresham was not yet in
Parliament, but an almost immediate vacancy was expected in his
division of the county, and it was known that no one could stand
against him with any chance of success. This threw him much among the
politicians of his party--those giants, namely, whom it would be his
business to support--and on this account he was a good deal away from
his own house at the present moment. "Politics make a terrible demand
on a man's time," he said to his wife; and then went down to dine at
his club in Pall Mall, with sundry other young philogeants. On men of
that class politics do make a great demand--at the hour of dinner and
thereabouts.
"What do you think of Miss Dunstable?" said Mrs. Gresham to her
uncle, as they sat together over their coffee. She added nothing to
the question, but asked it in all its baldness.
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