‘Poor Jack refused to let me pay for it,’ answered Lady Maulevrier.  ’He is vastly independent, and I fear somewhat reckless.’

‘I like him for his independence; but he mustn’t be reckless,’ said Mary, severely.

He was to be the master in all things! and yet she was to exercise a restraining influence, she was to guard him against his own weaknesses, his too generous impulses.  Her voice was to be the voice of prudence.  This is how Mary understood the marriage tie.

Under ordinary conditions Mary would have been in the avenue, lying in wait for her lover, eager to get the very first glimpse of him when he arrived, to see him before he had brushed the dust of the journey from his raiment.  But to-day she hung back.  She stayed in her grandmother’s room and sat beside the sofa, shy, and even a little downcast.  This lover who was so soon to be transformed into a husband was a formidable personage.  She dare not rush forth to greet him.  Perhaps he had changed his mind by this time, and was sorry he had ever asked her to marry him.  Perhaps he thought he was being hustled into a marriage.  He had been told that he was to wait at least a year.  And now, all in a moment, he was sent off to get a special licence.  How could she be quite sure that he liked this kind of treatment?

If there is any faith to be placed in the human countenance, Mr. Hammond was in no wise an unwilling bridegroom; for his face teamed with happy light as he came into the room presently, followed by an elderly man with grey hair and whiskers, and in a strictly professional frock coat, whom the butler announced as Mr. Dorncliffe.  Lady Maulevrier looked startled, somewhat offended even at this intrusion, and she gave Mr. Dorncliffe a very haughty salutation, which was almost more crushing than no salutation at all.

Mary stood up by her grandmother’s sofa, and looked rather frightened.

‘Dear Lady Maulevrier,’ said Hammond, ’I ventured to telegraph to my lawyer to meet me at York last night, and come on here with me this morning.  He has prepared a settlement, which I should like you to hear him read, and which he will explain to you, if necessary, while Molly and I go for a stroll in the grounds.’

He had never called her Molly before.  He put his arm round her with a proud air of possession, even under her grandmother’s eyes.  And she nestled close up to his side, forgetting everything but the delight of belonging to him.

They went downstairs, and through the billiard room to the terrace, and from the terrace to the tennis lawn, where John Hammond sat reading Heine nearly a year ago, just before he proposed to Lesbia.

‘Do you remember that day?’ asked Mary, looking at him, solemnly.

’I remember every day and every hour we have spent together since I began to love you,’ answered Hammond.