Her brother returned to Belwick next morning after an early breakfast.  He was in his wonted high spirits, and talked with much satisfaction of the acquaintances he had made on the previous day, while Adela waited upon him.  Mrs. Waltham only appeared as he was setting off.

Adela sat almost in silence whilst her mother breakfasted.

‘You don’t look well, dear?’ said the latter, coming to the little room upstairs soon after the meal.

‘Yes, I am well, mother.  But I want to speak to you.’

Mrs. Waltham seated herself in expectation.

‘Will you tell me why you so much wish me to marry Mr. Mutimer?’

Adela’s tone was quite other than she had hitherto used in conversations of this kind.  It was submissive, patiently questioning.

‘You mustn’t misunderstand me,’ replied the mother with some nervousness.  ’The wish, dear, must of course be yours as well.  You know that I—­that I really have left you to consult your own—­’

The sentence was unfinished.

‘But you have tried to persuade me, mother dear,’ pursued the gentle voice.  ‘You would not do so if you did not think it for my good.’

Something shot painfully through Mrs. Waltham’s heart.

’I am sure I have thought so, Adela; really I have thought so.  I know there are objections, but no marriage is in every way perfect.  I feel so sure of his character—­I mean of his character in a worldly sense.  And you might do so much to—­to show him the true way, might you not, darling?  I’m sure his heart is good.’

Mrs. Waltham also was speaking with less confidence than on former occasions.  She cast side glances at her daughter’s colourless face.

‘Mother, may I marry without feeling that—­that I love him?’

The face was flushed now for a moment.  Adela had never spoken that word to anyone; even to Letty she had scarcely murmured it.  The effect upon her of hearing it from her own lips was mysterious, awful; the sound did not die with her voice, but trembled in subtle harmonies along the chords of her being.

Her mother took the shaken form and drew it to her bosom.

’If he is your husband, darling, you will find that love grows.  It is always so.  Have no fear.  On his side there is not only love; he respects you deeply; he has told me so.’

’And you encourage me to accept him, mother?  It is your desire?  I am your child, and you can wish nothing that is not for my good.  Guide me, mother.  It is so hard to judge for myself.  You shall decide for me, indeed you shall.’

The mother’s heart was wrung.  For a moment she strove to speak the very truth, to utter a word about that love which Adela was resolutely excluding.  But the temptation to accept this unhoped surrender proved too strong.  She sobbed her answer.

’Yes, I do wish it, Adela.  You will find that I—­that I was not wrong.’

‘Then if he asks me, I will marry him.’