"Because he was frequently at Brosedale, and known to Sir Peter Fergusson."
"Ay, to be sure, that's true! I suppose it's to be a private marriage. We must see that it is quite correct, for, high or low, a wife has her rights. What did he say about going to church?"
"Oh! I scarcely know; something about my having been three weeks in the parish, and—"
"Did he?" returned Mrs. Kershaw; a more satisfied expression stealing over her face. "That looks like business, only I trust and hope he has not a wife already."
"What a fearful suspicion!" replied Ella, shuddering, while she smiled. "He was looked upon as an unmarried man at Brosedale, for I remember that Donald remarked that Miss Saville could find time to amuse him now, because Colonel Wilton condescended to visit him, and that he would be a peer, a nobleman, one day."
"A peer! a lord! well, I never! Of all the queer turns, this is the queerest. Still, I would like to make sure that there is no hitch nowhere. But, bless your heart, no gentleman or nobleman would go to church with a girl unless he was all square."
"I must trust him utterly, or not at all, he said. I do trust him," said Ella, softly, to herself, "even as he trusts me." She was sitting on the hearth-rug, gazing dreamily at a small but bright morsel of fire held together by fire-bricks.
"Trust is a word I never liked," observed Mrs. Kershaw, who was sitting bolt upright in an easy chair. "Ready money, in everything, is my motto; still, I must say, this gentleman seems straightforward." Mrs. Kershaw's opinions had become visibly modified since the rank of her fair protégé's intended had been revealed to her.
"I think he is," said Ella, simply.