From that time Lucy said less: in fact, her letters were nearly silent, as to you: and, for myself, I never gave another thought to the subject. Your present communication has taken me entirely by surprise.”
“But you will give her to me?”
“I had rather—forgive me if I speak candidly—that she married one who had not called another woman wife.”
“I heartily wish I never had called another wife,” was the response of Lionel. “But I cannot alter the past. I shall not make Lucy the less happy; and for loving her—I tell you that my love for her, throughout, has been so great, as to have put it almost beyond the power of suppression.”
A servant entered, and said, my lady was waiting tea. Lionel waved his hand towards the man with an impatient movement, and they were left at peace again.
“You tell me that her heart is engaged in this, as well as yours?” resumed Sir Henry.
A half-smile flitted for a moment over Lionel’s face; he was recalling Lucy’s whispered words to him that very afternoon.
“Yes,” he answered, “her heart is bound up in me: I may almost say her life. If ever love served out its apprenticeship, Sir Henry, ours has. It is stronger than ‘time and change.”
“Well,—I suppose you must have her,” conceded Sir Henry. “But for your own marriage, I should have looked on this as a natural result. What about the revenues of Verner’s Pride?”
“I am in debt,” freely acknowledged Lionel. “In my wife’s time we spent too much, and outran our means. Part of my income for three or four years must be set apart to pay it off.”
He might have said, “In my wife’s time she spent too much;” said it with truth. But, as he spared her feelings, living, so he spared her memory, dead.
“Whoever takes Lucy, takes thirty thousand pounds on her wedding-day,” quietly remarked Sir Henry Tempest.
The words quite startled Lionel. “Thirty thousand pounds!” he repeated mechanically.
“Thirty thousand pounds. Did you think I should waste all my best years in India, Lionel, and save up nothing for my only child?”
“I never thought about it,” was Lionel’s answer. “Or, if I ever did think, I suppose I judged by my father. He saved no money.”
“He had not the opportunity that I have had; and he died early. The appointment I held, out there, has been a lucrative one. That will be the amount of Lucy’s fortune.”
“I am glad I did not know it!” heartily affirmed Lionel.
“It might have made the winning her more difficult, I suppose you think?”
“Not the winning her,” was Lionel’s answer, the self-conscious smile again on his lips. “The winning your consent, Sir Henry.”
“It has not been so hard a task, either,” quaintly remarked Sir Henry, as he rose. “I am giving her to you, understand, for your father’s sake. In the trust that you are the same honourably good man, standing well before the world and Heaven, that he was. Unless your looks belie you, you are not degenerate.”
Lionel stood before him, almost too agitated to speak. Sir Henry stopped him, laying his hand upon his shoulder.
“No thanks, Lionel. Gratitude? You can pay that to Lucy after she shall be your wife.”
They went together into the drawing-room, arm-in-arm. Sir Henry advanced straight to his daughter.
“What am I to say to you, Lucy? He has been talking secrets.”
She looked up, like a startled fawn. But a glimpse at Lionel’s face reassured her, bringing the roses into her cheeks. Lady Verner, wondering, gazed at them in amazement, and Lucy hid her hot cheeks on her father’s breast.
“Am I to scold you? Falling in love without my permission!”
The tone, the loving arm wound round her, brought to her confidence. She could almost afford to be saucy.
“Don’t be angry, papa!” were her whispered words. “It might have been worse.”
“Worse!” returned Sir Henry, trying to get a look at her face. “You independent child! How could it have been worse?”
“It might have been Jan, you know, papa.”
And Sir Henry Tempest burst into an irrepressible laugh as he sat down.
CHAPTER LXVII. SUNDRY ARRIVALS.
We have had many fine days in this history, but never a finer one gladdened Deerham than the last that has to be recorded, ere its scene in these pages shall close. It was one of those rare lovely days that now and then do come to us in autumn. The air was clear, the sky bright, the sun hot as in summer, the grass green almost as in spring. It was evidently a day of rejoicing. Deerham, since the afternoon, seemed to be taking holiday, and as the sun began to get lower in the heavens, groups in their best attire were wending their way towards Verner’s Pride.
There was the centre of attraction. A fête—or whatever you might please to call it, where a great deal of feasting is going on—was about to be held on no mean scale. Innumerable tables, some large, some small, were set out in different parts of the grounds, their white cloths intimating that they were to be laden with good cheer. Tynn and his satellites bustled about, and believed they had never had such a day of work before.
A day of pleasure also, unexampled in their lives: for their master, Lionel Verner, was about to bring home his bride.
Everybody was flocking to the spot: old and young, gentle and simple. The Elmsleys and the half-starved Hooks; the Hautleys and those ill-doing Dawsons; the Miss Wests and their pupils; Lady Verner and the Frosts; Mr. Bitterworth in a hand-chair, his gouty foot swathed up in linen; Mrs. Duff, who had shut up her shop to come; Dan, in some new clothes; Mr. Peckaby and lady; Chuff the blacksmith, with rather a rolling gait; and Master Cheese and Jan—in short, all Deerham and its neighbourhood had turned out.
This was to be Master Cheese’s last appearance