Ida blushed at the mere notion of hobnobbing alone with a gentleman in that water-side lodging.
'No thanks; this will be my dinner,' she answered quietly. 'Please don't get anything more for me. No doubt Mr. Wendover will dine at the hotel, if he has not dined in London. I shall want nothing more except a cup of tea.'
After luncheon Ida went out and strolled by the river, that river of which no one ever seems to grow weary. She wandered about the level meadows, where the last of the wild-flowers were blooming, or she sat on the bank, watching the ripple of the water, the slow smooth passage of pleasure-boat or barge, and the day was long but not dreary. It was so new to her to be idle, to be able to fold her hands and watch the stream, and not to fear reproof because she had ceased from toil. At Mauleverer, at this tranquil afternoon hour, while those rooks were sailing so calmly high above her head—yonder belated butterfly fluttering so happily over the feathery grasses—all nature so full of rest—they were grinding away in the hot schoolroom, grinding at the weekly geography lesson, addling their brains with feeble efforts to repeat by rote dry-as-dust explanations about the equator and the torrid zone, latitude, longitude, winds and tides, the height of mountains, the population of towns, manufactures, creeds; not trying in the least to understand, or caring to remember; only intent on getting over to-day's trouble and preparing in some wise to meet the debts of to-morrow.
'Oh, thank God, to have got away from that treadmill,' said Ida, looking up at the bright blue sky; 'can I ever be sufficiently grateful to Providence, and to the man whose love has rescued me?'
Her deliverer came strolling across the fields in quest of her presently, tired and dusty, but delighted to be with her again. He sat down by her side, and put his arm round her waist for the first time in his life.
'Don't,' he said, as she instinctively recoiled from him; 'you are almost my own now. I have got the licence, I have seen the parson, and he is quite charmed at the idea of marrying us to-morrow morning. He had heard of your little escapade, it seems, and he thinks we are doing quite the wisest thing possible.'
'He had heard—already!' exclaimed Ida, deeply mortified. 'Has Miss Pew been calling out my delinquencies from the house-top? Oh, no,—I understand. Tuesday is Mr. Daly's afternoon for Bible class, and he has been at the school.'
'Exactly; and Miss Pew unburdened her mind to him.'
'Did he think me a dreadful creature?'
'He thinks you charming, but that I ought to have gone to the hall-door when I courted you; as I should have done, dearest, only I wanted to be sure of you first. He was all kindness, and will marry us quietly at nine o'clock to-morrow, just after Matins, when there will be nobody about to stare at us; and he has promised to say nothing about our marriage until we give him leave to make the fact public.'