'We shall grow old together, George,' she went on, murmuring rather than speaking.—I omit her lover's interruptions and interjections.—'You will always love me, long after my beauty—you know you will call it beauty, George—is past and gone: even when I am a poor old crone doubled up in my arm-chair: you will always love me. My life will be full—full—full of love. Perhaps——' Here her face flushed, and she stopped. 'We shall have no trouble about money: we shall go on always learning more and more, growing wiser and wiser and wiser. You will be a wise and good man, thinking and working all your life for other people, just as Mr. Dering imagined—three weeks ago. Everybody will love and respect you. Then you will grow grey-headed, you poor, dear boy; and all the world will say how wise and strong you are; and I shall be prouder of my old husband than even I was of my young lover. The life that others have dreamed, we shall live. Every day shall come laden with its own joy, so that we would not, if we could help it, suffer it to go away.' She struck a deeper note, and her voice trembled and sank and her eyes filled with tears: 'Life shall be all happiness, as God intended for us. Even Death will be little sorrow, for the separation will be so short.' Once more she laid her hand on his.
Even to the most frivolous, the prospect of the wedded life awakens grave and solemn thoughts: for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear and brains to understand, there is no prospect so charged with chances and possibilities, where even life itself may become a Death in Life.
When George left her in the evening, he drove to see Athelstan.
'So,' he said, 'you have been courting all day, I suppose. You ought to have had enough of it. Sit down and have something—a pipe—a cigar.—Well—you are going to be very jolly, I suppose. Elsie's little fortune will help a bit, won't it?'
'I should think so, indeed.'
'Yes—I've been very glad, ever since you told me that the child had had this stroke of luck. I wonder who gave her the money? To be sure, there is plenty of money knocking about among the Arundels. Most of us have had a sort of instinct for making money. Put us down anywhere among a lot of men in a city, and we begin to transfer the contents of their pockets to our own.'
'Meanwhile, give up this old resentment. Come back to your own people. Come to our wedding.'
'I cannot possibly, unless you will tell me who forged that cheque. How could I go back to people who still believe me guilty? When you are married, I will go and see Elsie, which I can do with a light heart. You have not told any one about my return?'
'Certainly not. No one suspects, and no one talks or thinks about you.'
Athelstan laughed a little. 'That is a doubtful piece of information. Am I to rejoice or to weep, because I am completely forgotten and out of mind? It is rather humiliating, isn't it?'