“What’s the fellow’s name?” asked Will.

Daisy turned again to the signature.  “Merton Hunt-Goring.  He was a major in the Sappers, but he has retired now, he says.  He can’t be very young.  He was no chicken in those days.  I didn’t really like him, you know; but he amused me.”

Will smiled.  “Poor darling!  Your bore of a husband never did that.”

She rubbed her cheek against his shoulder.  “Dear old duffer!  When are we going for that honeymoon of ours?  And what shall we do with Peggy?  Don’t say we’ve got to wait till she is safely married to Noel!”

Will’s eyes opened.  Never since Peggy’s birth had Peggy’s mother tolerated the possibility of leaving her.  He had always believed that her whole soul centred in the child, and he had been content to believe it; such was the greatness of his love.

“You would never bear to leave Peggy behind,” he said.

She laughed at him, her soft, mocking laugh of mischievous, elusive charm.  “Do you suppose I shall want a child to look after when I am on my honeymoon?  Of course I should leave her behind—­not alone with ayah, of course.  But that could be arranged.  Anyhow, it is high time she learned to toddle alone on her own wee legs for a little.  She is very independent already.  She wouldn’t really miss me, you know.”

“Wouldn’t she?” said Will.  “But what of you?  Your heart would ache for her from the moment you left her to the moment of your return.”

She laughed again, lightly, merrily, her cheek against his sleeve.

“Not with my own man to keep me happy.  There were no Peggies in the Garden of Eden, were there?” Then, as he still looked doubtful, “Oh, Will,—­my own dearest one—­how blind—­how blind thou art!”

That moved him, touching him very nearly.  He suddenly flushed a deep red.  His arm went swiftly round her.  “Daisy, Daisy—­” he whispered haltingly, “I am not—­not more to you than our child?”

She turned her face up to his; her eyes were full of tears though she was smiling still.  “More to me than all the world, dear,” she whispered back; “dearer to me than my hope of heaven.”

She had never spoken such words to him before; he had never dreamed to hear them on her lips.  It was not Daisy’s way to express herself thus.  In the far-off days of their courtship she had ever, daintily yet firmly, kept him at a distance.  Since those days she had suffered shipwreck—­a shipwreck from which his love alone had delivered her; but though the bond between them had drawn them very close, he had never pictured himself as ruling supreme in his wife’s heart.

He was strongly moved by the revelation; but it was utterly impossible to put his feeling into words.  He could only stoop and kiss her with a murmured, “God bless you, Daisy!”

They parted then, she to follow Peggy and superintend the evening tub, he to return to his desk and his work.