"No need to worry, Madame Kitty. Remember, I'm always there, if need be, with the money-bags. My idea is that if Nan doesn't like entire dependence on her husband, it may spur her into working at her music. I'm always waiting for her to do something big. And the desire for independence is a different spur—and a better one—-than the necessity of boiling the pot for dinner."
"You seem to have forgotten that being a professional musician is next door to a crime in Lady Gertrude's eyes," observed Kitty. "She doesn't care for anyone to do more than 'play a little' in a nice, amateur, lady-like fashion!"
"Then Lady Gertrude will have to learn better," replied St. John sharply. Adding, with a grim smile: "One of my wedding-presents to Nan will be a full-sized grand piano."
So, in accordance with Eliza's advice, everyone refrained from "playing providence" and Nan's engagement to Roger Trenby progressed along conventional lines. Letters of congratulation poured in upon them both, and Kitty grew unmistakably bored by the number of her friends in the neighbourhood who, impelled by curiosity concerning the future mistress of Trenby Hall, suddenly discovered that they owed a call at Mallow and that the present moment was an opportune time to pay it.
Nan herself was keyed up to a rather high pitch these days, and it was difficult for those who were watching her with the anxious eyes of friendship to gauge the extent of her happiness or otherwise. From the moment of Mallory's departure she had flung herself with zest into each day's amusement behaving precisely as though she hadn't a care in life—playing about with Sandy, and flirting so exasperatingly with Roger that, although she wore his ring, within himself he never felt quite sure of her.
Kitty used every endeavour to get the girl to herself for half an hour, hoping she might be able to extract the truth from her. But Nan had developed an extraordinary elusiveness and she skilfully avoided tête-à-tête talks with anyone other than Roger. Moreover, there was that in her manner which utterly forbade even the delicate probing of a friend. The Nan who was wont to be so frank and ingenuous—surprisingly so at times—seemed all at once to have retired behind an impenetrable wall of reticence.
Meanwhile Fenton and Penelope had mutually decided to admit none but a few intimate friends into the secret of their engagement. As Ralph sagely observed: "We shall be married so soon that it isn't worth while facing a barrage of congratulations over such a short engagement."
They were radiantly happy, with the kind of happiness that keeps bubbling up from sheer joy of itself—in love with each other in such a delightfully frank and barefaced manner that everyone at Mallow regarded them with gentle amusement and loved them for being lovers.
Nothing pleased Nan better than to persuade them into singing that quaintly charming old song, The Keys of Heaven—the words of which hold such a tender, whimsical understanding of the feminine heart. Perhaps the refusal of the coach and four black horses "as black as pitch," and of all the other good things wherewith the lover in the song seeks to embellish his suit, was not rendered with quite as much emphasis as it should have been. One might almost have suspected the lady of a desire not to be too discouraging in her denials. But the final verse lacked nothing in interpretation.
Passionate and beseeching, as the lover makes his last appeal, offering the greatest gift of all, Ralph's glorious baritone entreated her: