'The other minister will be here in a month,' he said to himself when sitting over the fire.

'Then I shall be off, and she will distract my mind no more!.

.

.

And then, shall I go on living by myself for ever?
No; when my two years of probation are finished, I shall have a furnished house to live in, with a varnished door and a brass knocker; and I'll march straight back to her, and ask her flat, as soon as the last plate is on the dresser! Thus a titillating fortnight was passed by young Stockdale, during which time things proceeded much as such matters have done ever since the beginning of history.