Diana plunged both her hands into her muff. If David took one of them, there was no knowing what might happen next. She remembered the compelling power of his eyes, as they drew her up the church, to take her place at his side. How would she feel, what would she do, if he turned and looked so, at her—now?
But David appeared to be quite intent on the sights of London, eagerly looking his last upon each well-known spot.
"I am glad this is a hired motor," he said, "and not your own chauffeur. This fellow does not drive so rapidly. One gets a chance to look out of the window. Ah, here is the Bank of England. I have never felt much interest in that. But I like seeing the Royal Exchange, because of the Prince Consort's text on the marble slab, high up in the centre of its façade."
They were held up for a moment in the stream of cross-traffic.
"My father pointed it out to me when I was a very little chap," continued David. "I really must see it again, for the last time."
He leaned forward to look up through the window on her side of the motor. His arm rested for a moment against Diana's knee.
"Yes, there it is, in golden letters, on the marble slab! 'The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof.' Wasn't it a grand idea? That those words should dominate this wonderful centre of the world's commerce, wealth, and enterprise. As if so great, so mighty, so influential a nation as our own, upon whose glorious flag the sun never sets, is yet humbly proud to look up and inscribe, in letters of gold, upon the very pinnacle of her supremacy: 'The earth is the Lord's!' All this wealth, all this power; these noble colonies, this world-encircling influence, may be mine; but—'The earth is the Lord's.'"
David's eyes glowed. "I am glad I have seen it once more. It is not so clear as when, holding tightly to my father's hand, I first looked up and saw it, twenty-two years ago. The letters are tarnished. If I were a rich man, I should like to have them regilt."
"You are a rich man," said Diana, smiling, "and it shall be done, David, if private enterprise is allowed the privilege."