She knew that this was no empty compliment, that he meant it from the depth of his heart, and was sorry that she could not respond to an affection so deep and so sincere.
“You have been very good to me—more good than I deserve,” she said, standing by the fire with lowered eyes, “I must thank you now for a splendid and beautiful present, and I really do not know how to find words in which fittingly to acknowledge it.”
“You cannot thank and gratify me better than by wearing what I have given you.”
“But when? Surely not on an ordinary evening?”
“No—certainly. The Rector has been up this afternoon and desired to see you, he is hot on a scheme for a public ball to be given at Wadebridge for the restoration of his church, and he has asked that you will be a patroness.”
“I—oh—I!—after my father’s death?”
“That was in the late spring, and now it is the early winter, besides, now you are a married lady—and was not the digging out and restoring of the church your father’s strong desire?”
“Yes—but he would never have had a ball for such a purpose.”
“The money must be raised somehow. So I promised for you. You could not well refuse—he was impatient to be off to Wadebridge and secure the assembly rooms.”
“But—Captain Coppinger—”