Hester understood him. She was to marry a man of her own station, which would save her many perplexities, but Craig, respecting no standard but personal merit, would have married above or beneath him with equal boldness. It was not because he was ambitious, but because he loved her that he had chosen Beatrice Mowbray. Yet Hester was anxious on his account.
"It's a big risk," she said. "The girl is dainty and fastidious. There's nothing coarse in you, but you have no outward polish. Perhaps the tastes you have inherited may make things easier."
"Well, sometimes I have a curious feeling about these Allenwood people. I seem to understand them; I find myself talking as they do. There was something Kenwyne said the other night about an English custom, and I seemed to know all about it, though I'd never heard of the thing before."
He got up and knocked out his pipe.
"All that doesn't matter," he said whimsically. "What's important now is that it's late, and I must have steam up on the plow by daybreak."
For the next week Harding was very busy; and then, coming back to the house one afternoon for some engine-packing, he found Beatrice alone in their plain living-room. She noticed the quick gleam of pleasure in his eyes and was conscious of a response to it, but she was very calm as she explained that Hester had gone to saddle a horse on which she meant to ride with her to Mrs. Broadwood's.
"That should give us ten minutes," Harding said. "There's something I once promised to show you and I may not have a better chance."
Unlocking a drawer, he took out a small rosewood box, finely inlaid.
"This was my father's. Hester has never seen it. I found it among his things."
"It is beautiful."