Maud was alone in the world and had no protector but him. She was in mourning, and objected to go to London and be brought out so soon after her father's death. The Castle was lonely and dreary. They were engaged to be married, and it could make no difference to anyone, and could be no offence against the puny laws of society, if they got married within the year and lived quietly at the Castle until the time of mourning had passed. Then they could go to London. They should know very few people at first, but that would soon be altered.
So the marriage had been fixed to take place on Wednesday the 8th of August, 1877.
The wedding was to be strictly private. No one was to be present but Mrs. Grant and Mr. Grey. The ceremony was to be performed by the rector, and the tenants were informed that the bride and bridegroom desired no demonstration of any kind.
After the ceremony Sir William and Lady Midharst were to return to the Castle, where no unusual preparation would be made to receive them.
This simple programme was carried out without let or accident. Grey and the baronet drove from Daneford, Maud and Mrs. Grant from the Castle, to the quiet country church, where the rector performed the short service by request. In the vestry Sir William handed Grey an envelope containing something. He said, "This is it, Grey." No more.
From the church the four drove back to Island Ferry. Here Grey bade the party good-bye. Sir William in saying good-bye added, under his breath, so that no one but Grey heard him, "for ever." Grey echoes the "for ever" in his heart, but took no further notice of the supplement to the farewell.
The banker then drove back to the Manor House.
"My last visit to the Castle," he thought, as he swept up the carriage-drive. "My last entry into the Manor House. To-day I bid a life-long adieu to the Weird Sisters. I am not sorry. I am over weary and want rest. I have allowed nothing to stand between me and ambition. I have lost the game and now I want only peace. What I have done cannot be undone. In a new climate, among new people, the past, the Weird Sisters, the Towers of Silence, and the story of my tower will fade into the background, and the things of the seventeenth of August will become as vague and shadowy to my mind as the story of the Spanish lady whose bones were found on the top of the tower in Warfinger Castle."
He had many things to arrange at the Manor that day, and had determined not to go to the Bank. He opened the envelope Sir William had given him, and found in it what he had been promised: a receipt in full for claims upon him in settlement of Miss Midharst's money. This receipt he put into the letter he had ready written for Aldridge and posted it. There had been trouble about the marriage settlement, but as Grey was guardian, and the baronet knew all about the money, things had gone smoothly in the end.
He spent most of the remainder of the day in the library looking through various books and accounts, but having slight interest in them. The day before a girl marries she cannot take a very lively interest in the gardener's work at her father's house. She is going to wear another name, break from old associations, and take up her residence in a new home. By to-morrow Grey would have changed his name, broken from old associations, and taken up his residence in a new home.