“Mistake? What mistake?”
“That of supposing she loved Hugh well enough to marry him.”
Sir Michael smote his thigh weakly.
“She would have, if she’d had a heart as big as a pea. Do you tell me he wasn’t the boy to make a girl love him? Why, there wasn’t man, woman, or child could stand out against Hugh when he set himself to win them. A heartless jade, Dick, a heartless jade!”
Wareham eyed the carpet with a frown. Sir Michael’s anger was unreasonable, because based on imperfect knowledge, and its daily repetition irritated him. One argument, and one only, sometimes availed to check it.
“He loved her to the last, sir. It would have cut him to the quick to think you hadn’t forgiven her.”
The old man covered his face with his hand.
“That was the boy all over. He had his mother’s kindly nature, sweet as sunshine. Never bore a grudge. If he and his cousin fell out and fought, Hugh would lend him his pony an hour afterwards, without a backward thought at his bruises. However badly she’d treated him, he’d have smoothed it over to you. Would she have married him?”
“He thought so.”
“Ay, ay, he would make the best of it. But what did you think, Dick?”