Mrs. Howard was not surprised when he began to plead for an early marriage.
“I can never settle down to my literary work until I am married; and, besides, I am anxious to call Fair my own.” He laughed, and then added: “What if this prince, who is soon to return, they say, should win her from me?”
“You need not be afraid of any man. Fair is devoted to you,” said Mrs. Howard.
“I am sure of that. I was only jesting about the prince,” said Bayard Lorraine. “But won’t you agree with me that an early marriage would be expedient?”
She was glad that he thought so. His desire coincided with hers, for she was anxious to see her beloved Fair settled for life.
“For it seems terrible to think of leaving her alone in the world, poor and unprotected, as she was when Heaven sent her to me,” she said anxiously.
So, with Fair’s consent, it was arranged that the marriage should take place a few weeks prior to their leaving the villa. The wedded pair would take a little tour of Paris while Mrs. Howard remained at the villa. Then they would come back, and the three would go home together to New York.
“Am I dreaming, or will all this happiness be really mine?” Fair asked herself, in fear and trembling, for now the weight of her secret began to weigh on her spirit.
She had never yet dared to make her confession to Bayard Lorraine. Shrinking coward that she was, she could not.