The little silence that followed, of sheer peace and content, was disturbed by a fierce onslaught of hail on the window-panes, and a blast of wind that swept and shrieked round the building like a legion of lost souls.
“My word, hark at that! It’s going to be a wild night,” said Roger. “No crossing for us to-morrow if it’s like this. Why, you’re shivering, dearest. Cold?”
“No, it’s only that dreadful wail of the wind. When I was a little girl my nurse used to tell me it was the souls of drowned sailors shrieking, and I believed her, for years and years.... God guard all who are on the sea to-night!”
The words, uttered in a fervent whisper, were a real and fervent prayer. He knew that as he looked down lovingly at her sweet, thoughtful face.
“D’you know, Roger,” she resumed presently, “I’m not sure that I want to go to Nice, or anywhere else abroad, after all.”
“Why, then, we won’t! The queen shall do exactly as she likes. I’m not a bit keen on a smart place either, only——”
Grace looked up with a little whimsical smile in which there was a touch of pathos.
“Only mother said we were to—that it was ‘the proper thing’—and it was less trouble to agree with her than to argue the point. That’s the real trouble, isn’t it? And, after all, we haven’t had a quiet moment to discuss anything between ourselves for weeks and weeks, what with mother and dressmakers on my side, and Sir Robert keeping you so hard at work on yours, right up to the last moment too, upsetting us all so, and nearly making you too late to be married! Tiresome old gentleman!”
“It wasn’t his fault,” said Roger hastily. “But don’t let us think any more of that. We’re free to please ourselves now—go where we like and do what we like. So what shall we do? Stay here?”
“No. I’ve been thinking. Really it flashed into my mind while I was dressing and waiting for you before dinner. There’s such a dear little place quite close here—St. Margaret’s—where daddy and I stayed when he was getting over influenza, just after Armistice—this very same time of year, when you were still in France, you poor boy! We had the loveliest time, all by ourselves. Mother wouldn’t come; she said it would be too deadly in the winter, but it wasn’t—not for us, anyhow! And we had the cosiest rooms imaginable in a dinky cottage on the cliff, a regular sun-trap, with a dear old landlady, Miss Culpepper, who reminded us of ‘Cranford’ and cherished us both no end. Let’s go over and see if she’s still there and can put us up. I expect she can, for I remember we seemed to have the whole place to ourselves.”