"Perhaps I might be a deputy dispensation, mightn't I?" said Viviette.
"I don't think mother is so desperately attached to Dick as all that. It
could be arranged somehow or other. And Dick is growing more and more
wretched about it every day. Every day he pours out his woes to me till
I can almost howl with misery."
"What do you want me to do?"
"Not to stand in his way if he gets a chance of going abroad."
"Of course I won't," cried Austin eagerly. "It never entered my head
that he wanted to go away. I would do anything in the world for his
happiness, poor old chap. I love Dick very deeply. In spite of his huge
bulk and rough ways there's something of the woman in him that makes one
love him."
They catalogued Dick's virtues, and then Viviette unfolded her scheme.
One or other of the powerful personages whom, in her young confidence,
she proposed to attack, would surely know of some opening abroad.
"Even humble I sometimes hear of things," said Austin. "Only a day or
two ago old Lord Overton asked me if I knew of a man who could manage a
timber forest he's got in Vancouver--"
Viviette jumped up and clapped her hands.
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