A few words from Philippa announcing her safe arrival at home, and ending with affectionate expressions of gratitude to her kind cousins, reached Dorriford the following day.
Then came a blank extending over a fortnight, by the end of which time Miss Lermont began to fear that something must be the matter at Greenleaves.
She was on the point of writing again to Philippa to inquire the cause of her silence, when a letter arrived. It was a long letter and marked “private,” though no restrictions were placed on Maida as to making known to her family the news it contained.
“My hesitation has vanished,” were the words with which Philippa preluded the announcement of her engagement to Michael Gresham. “I am perfectly happy, perfectly satisfied, though it has been difficult for me to believe myself worthy of him. But as he thinks I am—”
More practical details followed. It was not a “brilliant” marriage, such as Evelyn Headfort had dreamt of for her sister. A life of some restrictions, even possibly of a certain amount of struggle, was before her and Michael, but a life brightened and ennobled by high aims and many worthy interests outside themselves, by, above all, completest confidence and mutual sympathy.
“It seems almost ideal,” thought Maida, as she finished the letter. “I can feel no fears or apprehensions about a marriage like that, whatever the world may say as to the necessity of wealth.”
For Maida’s eyes were growing very clear as to the real estimate of things—she was nearing the heights where earth-born clouds and mists begin to melt away in the everlasting sunshine.
Up to the present time, Bernard Gresham is still unmarried, not having as yet succeeded in discovering the flawless gem among women, to whom he could without misgiving entrust his happiness, and who alone would be fitted to shine as mistress of Merle. He now by no means regrets Philippa’s little looked-for refusal of the honour he laid before her, vainly as he has endeavoured satisfactorily to account to himself for it. But as his cousin’s wife he quite approves of her, and he is always ready cordially to welcome her and her husband when they can spare a week or two for a visit to Merle, on which occasions it is unnecessary to say that “Solomon” again figures as one of Philippa’s fellow-travellers.
The End.