Mrs Dale had been present during the interview in which John Eames had made his prayer to her daughter, but she had said little or nothing on that occasion.  All her wishes had been in favour of the suitor, but she had not dared to express them, neither had she dared to leave the room.  It had been hard upon him to be thus forced to declare his love in the presence of a third person, but he had done it, and had gone away with his answer.  Then, when the thing was over, Lily, without any communion with her mother, took herself off, and was no more seen till the evening hours had come on, in which it was natural that they should be together again.  Mrs Dale, when thus alone, had been able to think of nothing but this new suit for her daughter’s hand.  If only it might be accomplished!  If any words from her to Lily might be efficacious to such an end!  And yet, hitherto, she had been afraid almost to utter a word.

She knew that it was very difficult.  She declared to herself over and over that he had come too soon,—­that the attempt had been made too quickly after that other shipwreck.  How was it possible that the ship should put to sea again at once, with all her timbers so rudely strained?  And yet, now that the attempt had been made, now that Eames had uttered his request and been sent away with an answer, she felt that she must at once speak to Lily on the subject, if ever she were to speak upon it.  She thought that she understood her child and all her feelings.  She recognised the violence of the shock which must be encountered before Lily could be brought to acknowledge such a change in her heart.  But if the thing could be done, Lily would be a happy woman.  When once done it would be in all respects a blessing.  And if it were not done, might not Lily’s life be blank, lonely, and loveless to the end?  Yet when Lily came down in the evening, with some light, half-joking word on her lips, as was usual to her, Mrs Dale was still afraid to venture upon her task.

“I suppose, mamma, we may consider it as a settled thing that everything must be again unpacked, and that the lodging scheme will be given up.”

“I don’t know that, my dear.”

“Oh, but I do—­after what you said just now.  What geese everybody will think us!”

“I shouldn’t care a bit for that, if we didn’t think ourselves geese, or if your uncle did not think us so.”

“I believe he would think we were swans.  If I had ever thought he would be so much in earnest about it, or that he would ever have cared about our being here, I would never have voted for going.  But he is so strange.  He is affectionate when he ought to be angry, and ill-natured when he ought to be gentle and kind.”

“He has, at any rate, given us reason to feel sure of his affection.”

“For us girls, I never doubted it.  But, mamma, I don’t think I could face Mrs Boyce.  Mrs Hearn and Mrs Crump would be very bad, and Hopkins would come down upon us terribly when he found that we had given way.  But Mrs Boyce would be worse than any of them.  Can’t you fancy the tone of her congratulations?”