"Isn't it," she said, "with the sun shining and the mountains and the rocks and the sea all there, just like a picture? Oh, there's no doubt but it's a beautiful world."
"And you and I and Charles going out to see it all together. It's a fine world, every bit of it—and the little bit we're just coming to is Caernarvon."
Caernarvon it was, and they spent nearly a week there. The castle is all that a castle should be; and as for the sea, what can be better, unless it's in Cornwall; and there is Anglesea, lying flat against the sky, and the Elephant Mountain and the Seven Sisters, and old Snowdon topping all.
The inn was comfortable, the weather had grown kind again, the hostler was one of those to whom Charles's personality so much appealed that the dog was almost too replete with good living to appreciate the rats provided for his recreation. This hostler, Owen Llewellyn, became such an enthusiast in the service of Charles that Mr. Basingstoke was only able by a fortunate chance, the strong exercise of authority, and a golden offering for the soothing of wounded feelings to stop the entertainment which Owen had arranged with several of his friends in a handy field and the cool of the evening: a quiet little dog-fight, as the friends indignantly explained, with Charles and a worthy antagonist filling the leading rôles.
"It isn't as if the dogs wouldn't enjoy it more than any one else, and me putting all my money on your dog, sir," one of the friends (from London) complained. "There ain't nothing that that there dog 'u'd love better nor a bit of a scrap. An' you to go agin the animal's natural desires and keep him for a lap-dog for the lady. It ain't right," he ended, feelingly, as the lap-dog was led off, yapping defiance at the adversary whom, so his admirers swore, he could have licked hollow with one paw tied behind him.
It was at Caernarvon that Edward and his princess lived the quiet life that does not lead to sight-seeing. There was something poignantly domestic to his mind in those long mornings in green fields or among the broken and still beautiful colonnades of the castle, he with a book from which he read to her, she with some work of embroidery in which a bright needle flashed among pleasant-colored silks. It was in the castle, in one of those mysterious narrow passages, that they came face to face with a tall, handsome man of middle age, who shook Edward's hand with extreme vigor, clapped him on the back, and announced that he would have run a mile for the sake of seeing him. Edward would have run two to avoid the meeting, because the eyes of the back-clapper were turned on Katherine, awaiting the introduction which must come. Colonel Bertram, an old friend of Edward's father's, knew well enough that Edward was an only child. No brother-and-sister tale was possible here.
"Do you hang out in these parts?" Edward asked. "I wonder you knew me. I don't believe we've met since I was about sixteen."
While he spoke he looked a question at her, and read the slightest possible sign with which she answered.
"Colonel Bertram—my wife. Katherine, the Colonel used to tip me sovereigns when I was at school, and he gave me my first pony."
The colonel's grip ground her rings into her hand. "'Pon my word!" he said, "I don't know when I've been so pleased. You must come and dine with us, my boy, to-night— To-morrow? Make him come, Mrs. Basingstoke. I know it's not manners to intrude on a honeymoon, but I am such an old friend, and our meeting like this is such a remarkable coincidence, almost like the finger of Providence—upon my soul it is."