"I don't know. I hope not. I cannot tell you myself. He will explain everything if you will see him this evening. He came back to Melbourne with us, and he is waiting to see you."
"Tell me this much, at any rate," said Mr. Yelverton, anxiously; "it is no just cause or impediment to our being married to-morrow, is it?"
"No. At least, I don't think so. I hope you won't."
"I shan't if you don't, you may depend upon that." He made up his mind on the spot that there were some shady pages in her family history that a sense of honour prompted her to reveal to him before he married her, and congratulated himself that she was not like the conventional heroine, who would have been too proud to make him happy under such circumstances. "I am not afraid of Mr. Brion, if you are not," he repeated. "And we will shunt him for the present, with your permission. Somehow I can't bring myself to think of anybody just now except you and me." The picture galleries were pretty full by this time, and the public was invading the privacy of the German Court rather freely. "Come and let us walk about a little," he said, rising from the ottoman, "and enjoy the sensation of being alone in a crowd." And they sauntered out into the corridor, and down the stairs, and up and down the long nave, side by side—a distinguished and imposing if not strictly handsome couple—passing shoals of people, and bowing now and then to an acquaintance; mixing unsuspected with the common herd, and hugging the delicious consciousness that in secret they were alone and apart from everybody. They talked with more ease and freedom than when tête-à-tête on their settee upstairs.
"And so, by this time to-morrow, we shall be man and wife," Mr. Yelverton said, musingly. "Doesn't your head swim a little when you think of that, Elizabeth? I feel as if I had been drinking, and I am terribly afraid of finding myself sober presently. No, I am not afraid," he continued, correcting himself. "You have given me your promise, and you won't go back on it, as the Yankees say, will you?"
"If either of us goes back," said Elizabeth, unblushingly; "it won't be me."
"You seem to think it possible that I may go back? Don't you flatter yourself, my young friend. When you come here to-morrow, as you will, in that pretty cool gown—I stipulate for that gown remember—"
"Even if it is a cold day?—or pouring with rain?"
"Well, I don't know. Couldn't you put a warm jacket over it? When you come here to-morrow, I say, you will find me waiting for you, the embodiment of relentless fate, with the wedding ring in my pocket. By the way—that reminds me—how am I to know the size of your finger? And you have not got your engagement ring yet! I'll tell you what we'll do, Elizabeth; we'll choose a ring out of the Exhibition, and we'll cheat the customs for once. The small things are smuggled out of the place all day long, and every day, as you may see by taking stock of the show cases occasionally. We'll be smugglers too—it is in a good cause—and I'll go so far as to use bribery and corruption, if necessary, to get possession of that ring to-day. I'll say, 'Let me have it now, or I won't have it at all,' and you will see they'll let me have it. I will then put it on your finger, and you shall wear it for a little while, and then I will borrow it to get the size of your wedding ring from it. By-and-bye, you know, when we are at home at Yelverton—years hence, when we are old people—"
"Oh, don't talk of our being old people!" she interrupted, quickly.