She hung lovingly on the arm of Mark as they crossed the corridor. The light was low there and nobody was about.
"I hope you are going to forgive me, dear," she said. "I came very near to paying a heavy penalty for not trusting in you, Mark. But everything is going my way now."
"Our way," Mark protested. "I don't care whether anybody is looking or not, I am going to kiss you, dearest. You have always belonged to me and to nobody else. I cannot possibly regard you in the light of Stephen Richford's widow. If I were you, I would not say anything to the others until after I have settled matters between your father and mine. Let Mary Grey have a good night's rest, and pack her off to bed as soon as possible."
Mary was safely in bed and asleep before Mark came back. Berrington stayed long enough for Beatrice to tell him exactly what had happened. The melancholy shade that Beatrice had seen so long on Berrington's face had vanished altogether.
"My poor little girl is going to have peace and happiness at last," he said, with a deep thrill in his voice. "We shall value it all the more because we have waited for it so long, so that the three years of our probation will not be altogether wasted. I expect there will be a good deal of talk about Carl Sartoris for a few days to come, but that need not concern Mary, who has never been identified with that scoundrel, and whose name is Grey, after all. In the course of a few days I am going to take Mary away and we shall be married very quietly. I am determined to try to get the roses back to her cheeks again."
"I hope you will be happy, as you deserve to be," Beatrice said with some emotion. "But I shall be sorry to lose two such good, kind friends, and——"
"You are not going to lose us," Berrington said. "I am going to give up soldiering altogether. I have only carried it on for the last few years, because I needed something to keep me from brooding over my
troubles. I am going to settle down on my property at last. Good-night."
Beatrice shook Berrington warmly by the hand, and he kissed her little fingers. He had barely departed before Mark was back with a little wiry man with a keen face and a pair of grey eyes that seemed to see into everything.
"So this is Beatrice," he said, as he shook hands. "You must let me call you that, my dear, because you are going to be my daughter, Mark tells me. I am a plain man who has more or less lived for business all his life, but begins to see lately that business is not everything. It does not make for happiness, for instance. When I was ill I began to see that. But at any rate the result of my business can make others happy."