Richard had never realized this more thoroughly than when, on Christmas afternoon, he invited Benson to drive with him for a last inspection of a certain spot which had been prepared for the reception of the bridal pair at the first stage of their journey.  He could not, as Hugh took his place beside him and the two whirled away down the frost-covered avenue, imagine asking any other man in the world to go with him on such a visit.  There was no other man he knew who would not have made it the occasion for more or less distasteful raillery; but Hugh Benson was of the rarely few, he felt, who would understand what that “stout little cabin” meant to him.

They came upon it presently, standing bleak and bare as to exterior upon its hilltop, with only a streaming pillar of smoke from its big chimney to suggest that it might be habitable within.  But when the heavy door was thrown open, an interior of warmth and comfort presented itself such as brought an exclamation of wonder from the guest, and made Richard’s eyes shine with satisfaction.

The long, low room had been furnished simply but fittingly with such hangings, rugs, and few articles of furniture as should suggest home-likeness and service.  Before the wide hearth stood two big winged chairs, and a set of bookshelves was filled with a carefully chosen collection of favourite books.  The colourings were warm but harmonious, and upon a heavy table, now covered with a rich, dull red cloth, stood a lamp of generous proportions and beauty of design.

“I’ve tried to steer a line between luxury and austerity,” Richard explained, as Hugh looked about him with pleased observation.  “We shall not be equipped for real roughing it—­not this time, though sometimes we may like to come here dressed as hunters and try living on bare boards.  I just wanted it to seem like a bit of home, when she comes in to-night.  There’ll be some flowers here then, of course—­lots of them, and that ought to give it the last touch.  There are always flowers in her home, bowls of them, everywhere—­it was one of the first things I noticed.  Do you think she will like it here?” he ended, with a hint of almost boyish diffidence in his tone.

“Like it?  It’s wonderful.  I never heard of anything so—­so—­all it should be for—­a girl like her,” Hugh exclaimed, lamely enough, yet with a certain eloquence of inflection which meant more than his choice of words.  He turned to Richard.  “I can’t tell you,” he went on, flushing with the effort to convey to his friend his deep feeling, “how fortunate I think you are, and how I hope—­oh, I hope you and she will be—­the happiest people in the world!”

“I’m sure you hope that, old fellow,” Richard answered, more touched by this difficult voicing of what he knew to be Hugh’s genuine devotion than he should have been by the most felicitous phrasing of another’s congratulations.  “And I can tell you this.  There’s nobody else I know whom I would have brought here to see my preparations—­nobody else who would have understood how I feel about—­what I’m doing to-day.  I never should have believed it would have seemed so—­well, so sacred a thing to take a girl away from all the people who love her, and bring her to a place like this.  I wish—­wish I were a thousand times more fit for her.”