“Well, now,” cried Bertha, “I see that I am making a mess of it. So we had better stop just where we are. You have asked me to go to drive with you. I accept your invitation with pleasure.”
When they arrived at Stoke Pogis, Jack tied the horse to a convenient hitching-post and they went into the secluded churchyard.
As they stood by the tomb of the poet’s mother, Jack read aloud the inscription upon it.
“He must have loved his mother devotedly,” said Bertha.
“All really good men love their mothers,” said Jack. “To me my mother is the dearest creature in the world.” Then it suddenly occurred to him that he had made two unfortunate admissions. By implication he had given his hearer to understand that he was a really good man, and in the second case he had told her that he loved his mother better than any person else. “What a blundering fool I have been,” he said to himself. “The old Greek was right when he wrote that silence is the greatest of all virtues.”
He had been very brave while sitting in Victor’s room, when he had declared his fixed purpose to propose to Miss Renville at sight, but as he gazed into her beautiful face his courage left him.
Miss Renville, fortunately, changed the subject. “My mother died when I was very young, and I was but six years old when I lost my father, but Guardy has been very good to me. If my parents had lived longer, I should have felt their loss much more than I have. Is your father living, Mr. De Vinne?”
“Oh, yes,” said Jack. “He is hale and hearty. They used to say that there was no stronger, sturdier man in the House of Lords.”
“What?” cried Bertha, with astonishment. “Is your father a peer?”
“Why, didn’t you know?” asked Jack. “I imagined Clarence must have told you. My father is the Earl of Noxton. My home is at Noxton Hall in Surrey.”