She stared at him with puckered brows. She thought of Sir Richard, of the adventures she had encountered in his company, and of the laughter in his eyes, and of the teasing note in his voice. Suddenly she flushed rosily, and the tears started to her own eyes. “Yes. Oh, yes, I do!” she said.
“Well! But what is there to cry over?” demanded Piers.
“For a moment I quite thought—Now, don’t be silly, Pen!”
She blew her nose defiantly, and said in somewhat watery accents: “I’m not crying!”
“Indeed, I can’t conceive why you should. I think Wyndham a very good sort of man—a famous fellow! I suppose you will become very fashionable, Pen, and cut the deuce of a dash in town!”
Pen, who could see no future beyond a life spent within the walls of her aunt’s respectable house, agreed to this, and made haste to direct the conversation into less painful channels.
Although Keynsham was situated only a few miles distant from Queen Charlton, it was close on the dinner-hour when Piers set Pen down at the George Inn again. By this time, a post-chaise had been hired, and four good horses chosen to draw it, the whole being appointed to arrive at a rendezvous outside the gates of Crome Hall at half-past eleven that evening. Beyond a certain degree of anxiety concerning the extent of the baggage his betrothed would wish to bring with her, and some fears that her flight might be intercepted at the outset, Mr Luttrell had nothing further to worry about, as his guide and mentor frequently assured him.
Pen would have liked to have been present at the fatal hour, but this offer Piers declined. They bade each other farewell, therefore, at the door of the George Inn, neither suffering the smallest pang at the notion that each was about to be joined in wedlock to another.
Having waved a last good-bye to her old playmate, Pen went into the inn, and was met by Sir Richard, who looked her up and down, and said: “Abominable brat, you had better make a clean breast of the whole! Where have you been, and what mischief have you done?”
“Oh, but I left a message for you!” Pen protested. “Did they not give it to you, sir?”