She herself, however, seemed to be wholly unaware of any incongruity. Perhaps she had not seen enough of the world to feel it, or perhaps she was wilfully blind to the things she did not desire to see.
In any case her face, as she lay back in the carriage by her husband's side, expressed only the most complete contentment.
"Are you tired, Eustace?" she asked, as he did not hasten to reply to her first question.
"No," he answered, "not tired; but glad to be going back."
"You've been bored," she said quickly. "What a frightful pity! Why did you stay so long?"
Again he paused before replying, and she drummed on his knee with her fingers with slight impatience.
"I had a notion," he said, in his quiet, unhurried tones, "that my wife would have considered it rather hard lines to be dragged away while there was a single man left to dance with."
The bride snatched her hand from his knee with a swiftness of action that could hardly be mistaken. He might have been speaking in fun, but, even so, it was an ugly jest. More probably he had meant the sting that his words conveyed, for, owing to a delicate knee-cap that had once been splintered by a bullet and still at times gave him trouble, Major Tudor was a non-dancer. Whatever his meaning, the remark came upon her flushed triumph like the icy chill before the dawn, dispelling dreams.
"I am sorry," she said, with all the haste of youth, "that you sacrificed yourself to please me. I hope you will not do so again. Now that I am married, I do not need a chaperon. I could quite well return alone."