"She is. Why, he took mother down to the river last Sunday and showed her a big hole there, where Plym comes over the rocks and the waters all a-boil and twelve feet deep. 'That's where you'll find me, mother,' he says. And she, poor soul, was frightened out of her wits. And father's worried too, for Ned can't go wrong with him. Ned may always do what he likes, though I may not."
Cora declared her sympathy, but Mark did not take the incident as grave.
"You needn't fear," he assured Ned's brother. "Men that talk openly of killing themselves, never do it. Words are a safety-valve. 'Tis the sort that go silent and cheerful under a great blow that be nearest death."
Cora spoke of Ned's looks with admiration and feared that this great disappointment might spoil them; but Milly was not so sympathetic.
"If he stood to work and didn't think so much about the maidens, they might think a bit more about him," she said.
"He swears he won't play St. George now," added Rupert. "He haven't got the heart to go play-acting no more."
"He'll find twenty girls to go philandering after afore winter," foretold Milly. "And if Cora here was to ask him, he'd play St. George fast enough."
"'Twill be a very poor compliment to me if he cries off now," declared Cora. "For I'm to be the princess, and 'tis pretended in the play that he's my true lover."
"Mark will be jealous then. 'Tis a pity he don't play St. George," said Milly.
But Mark laughed.