‘He never asks me to go with him.’
‘No?’
‘It is so amusing, I think. What does Michael say to it?’
‘Michael—oh, he laughs, and says it is very good of me to let him come, and that it is a good sign for Mr. Askam’s future career that he frequents any decent society at all,’ she said, with a short, dry laugh, of which Gilbert’s answering one seemed an echo, so much were they alike in tone.
‘How beautiful of him! When you are married to him, Magdalen,’ he added, speaking very slowly, and openly watching her face—‘when you are married to Michael, and fairly established as Mrs. Langstroth, for which consummation you have waited so faithfully and so patiently,’—he dwelt upon all his words—‘I should say that then Michael would find it rather a bore to have Otho Askam coming in, and you would, too. Don’t you think so?’
‘How can I tell? I should say that Otho Askam would find it a bore himself, when I am married to Michael, if ever I should be. As you say, I have waited a long time, and I may have a longer one yet to wait, before I am Michael’s wife.’
She spoke with a dead monotony of tone, and a no less monotonous expression in her face. They stood now in front of the house. Magdalen beckoned to a gardener’s boy, and told him to send a groom for Gilbert’s horse, after which they went into the house, into Magdalen’s sitting-room, and she cast off her fur cloak, and began to make tea, with the firelight shining on her crimson gown. Gilbert sat in a low chair and watched her, but said nothing. Only when she handed him his cup of tea, he said softly—
‘Magdalen, I do wish you and Michael could be married to-morrow.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Then your life would be brighter.’