moment Sir Stephen is making for a peerage for himself—­or you.  He can possibly gain his; but you, having no brains to speak of—­the fact that good-looking men are always deficient in that respect is a continual and blessed consolation to us plain ones, Staff—­will have to make what the world calls a ‘good marriage.’  Doubtless your father already has the future bride in his eye; the daughter of a peer—­high in the government, perhaps in the cabinet—­probably.  Probably that is why he has asked you to meet him here.  I hope, for your sake, that she is good-looking.  I fancy”—­musingly—­“that you would be rather particular.  If rumour does you no injustice, you always have been.”

Stafford laughed shortly.

“I’ve never thought about marrying,” he said, rather absently.

“No one does, my dear fellow.  It comes, like measles and other unpleasant things, without thought; and when it comes, it is generally as unpleasant.  Aren’t we going at a tremendous rate, Stafford?  Don’t think I am nervous; I have ridden beside you too often for that.  You destroyed what nerve I possessed long ago.”

“We are late, and it’s farther round than I thought,” said Stafford.  “The horses are fresh.”

“I daresay; very probably Pottinger has given them a double feed; he would naturally like them to dash up in fine style.  But if it’s all the same to you”—­as the horses broke into a gallop—­“I should prefer to arrive at your father’s ‘little place’ in a more dignified fashion than on a stretcher.”

Stafford smiled and checked the high-spirited pair.

“You talk of women as if they were a—­a kind of plague; you were never in love, Howard?” he asked.

“Never, thank Heaven!” responded Howard, devoutly.  “When I think of it, I acknowledge that I have much to be thankful for.  I was once:  she was a girl with dark eyes—­but I will spare you a minute description.  I met her in a country rectory—­is that horse, I think you call it the near one—­going to jump over the bank?  And one remarkably fine evening—­it was moonlight, I remember—­I was on the point of declaring my love; and then the gods saved me.  The thought flashed upon me that, if she said ‘yes,’ I should have to sit opposite her at dinner for the rest of one of our lives.  It saved me.  I said that I thought it was chilly, and went in and up to bed, grateful for my escape.  Why don’t you laugh?”

Stafford only smiled in a perfunctory fashion.  He was thinking of the girl he had watched riding off on the unbroken colt; of what it would seem like if she were seated opposite him, with the candle-light falling on her soft white dress, with diamonds gleaming in it, diamonds outshone by the splendour of those dark, violet-grey eyes; of what it would seem like if he could rise from his seat and go to her and take her in his arms and look into those dark grey eyes, and say, “You are mine, mine!” with no one to say him nay.