It irked him that he couldn’t say, “As mud.” She was too passionately in earnest for him to dare the flippancies. He said, “Yes, that’s clear.”
“And Staithley in particular. I’m Staithley born and bred. Bred, I’m telling you, in Staithley Streets. My name’s Bradshaw.”
He lashed his memory, aware dimly that Bradshaw had associations for him other than the railway-guide. It was coming to him now. The Staithley Bradshaws, that sixteenth birthday interview with his father, his own disparaging of Tom Bradshaw and Sir Philip’s defense of him. His father had been right, too. Tom was in some office under the Coalition, pulling his weight like all the rest. The war had proved his sportsmanship, as it had everybody’s. He hadn’t a doubt that any of the Staithley Bradshaws who were in the army were splendid soldiers.
In the ranks, though.
One thought twice about marrying their sister. He wished she hadn’t told him, and as he wished it she was emphasizing, “I’m from the Begging Bradshaws.”
He forced a smile. “You’re a long way from them, then,” he said, and she agreed on that.
“Oh, yes,” she said, “I’m eight years from them. I don’t know them and they don’t know me. I’m Mary Arden to every one but you: only when you say your idea of love is finding comfort in my arms, I had to tell you just whose arms they are. I’m Bradshaw and I’ve sung for pennies in the Staithley Streets.”
Some of the implications he did not perceive at once, but he saw the one that mattered. His sphinx had spoken now. She “had” to tell him, and there were only two reasons why. The first was that she loved him, and the second was that she was honest in her love—“Mary,” he said, “you’ll marry me.”
“No.”
“If you want arguments about a thing that’s settled, I’ll give you them,” he said. “You don’t know what a gift you’ve brought me. You don’t know how magnificently it suits me that you’re Bradshaw.”