Emily replied that she could not, she was to dine with a neighbour; and she shortly departed, in possession of the most imprudent speeches John had ever made (for he was usually most reticent), and she could not guess of course that one of his assertions time had already falsified.  He had decided on the lady.

While the notion that he must marry had slumbered, his thought that Emily should be his wife had slumbered also; but that morning, driving towards Wigfield, he had stopped at his own house to give some orders, and then had gone up into “Parliament” to fetch out some small possessions that his twin daughters wanted.  There, standing for a moment to look about him, his eyes had fallen on his throne, and instantly the image of Emily had recurred to him, and her attitude as she held his little child.  To give a step-mother to his children had always been a painful thought.  They might be snubbed, misrepresented to him, uncherished, unloved.  But Emily! there was the tender grace of motherhood in her every action towards a little child; her yearning sense of loss found its best appeasement in the pretty exactions and artless dependence of small young creatures.  No; Emily might spoil step-children if she had them, but she could not be unkind.

His cold opinion became a moderately pleased conviction.  This was so much the right thing, that once contemplated, it became the only thing.  He recalled her image again, as he looked at the empty throne, and he did not leave the room till he had fully decided to set her on it.

When John went back to dinner, he soon managed to introduce her name, and found those about him very willing to talk of her.  It seemed so natural in that house.  John recalled some of the anecdotes of her joyous girlhood for Dorothea’s benefit; they laughed over them together.  They all talked a good deal that evening of Emily, but this made no difference to John’s intention; it was fully formed already.

So the next morning, having quite recovered his spirits, and almost forgotten what he had said three days before to his host, he remarked to himself, just as he finished dressing, “She has been a widow now rather more than a year.  The sooner I do it, the better.”

He sat down to cogitate.  It was not yet breakfast time.  “Well,” he said, “she is a sweet creature.  What would I have, I wonder!”

He took a little red morocco case from his pocket-book, and opened it.

“My father was exceedingly fond of her,” he next said, “and nothing would have pleased him better.”

His father had inherited a very fine diamond ring from his old cousin, and had been in the habit of wearing it.  John, who never decked himself in jewellery of any sort, had lately taken this ring to London, and left it with his jeweller, to be altered so as to fit a lady’s finger.  He intended it for his future wife.

It had just been sent back to him.