'I didn't want to, Meg. He made me.'
'What, that man, the Bishop of Ligeria?'
'No, The Man, the Bishop of my soul, darling.'
'Oh, father!'
'Didn't you know that I was once going into the army, Meg? It seemed to me then, as now, the only conceivable thing to do, as the Fotheringhams have always been soldiers. But I found that HE had other views about it, and I had to chuck it up at the last minute. My father was so furious with me that he chucked me out.'
'Oh, daddy!'
'And I have felt lately that there is something else I am required to do, and I don't want to do it. Sometimes I think that this pleasant Devonshire life is not the one to which I am to be allowed to 'settle down.'
'And yet you like Him, father?'
'And yet I "like Him," Meg, but, oh, I really don't think I can let you be married in the morning. I shall have to get Porky to say the bit of the service that really matters, for I shall be tempted to leave it out.'
And although father laughed as he said it, yet, from the struggle in his face, I seemed to understand suddenly that my marriage was for him only another 'bit of harness' which had been 'hewn' away. But why?'