The Last Chronicle of Barset

CHAPTER XLV

LILY DALE GOES TO LON­DON

One morn­ing to­wards the end of March the squire rapped at the win­dow of the draw­ing-​room of the Small House in which Mrs Dale and Lily were sit­ting. He had a let­ter in his hand, and both Lily and her moth­er knew that he had come down to speak about the con­tents of the let­ter. It was al­ways a sign of good-​hu­mour on the squire’s part, this rap­ping at the win­dow. When it be­came nec­es­sary to him in his gloomy moods to see his sis­ter-​in-​law, he would write a note to her, and she would go across to him at the Great House. At oth­er times, if, as Lily would say, he was just then nei­ther sweet nor bit­ter, he would go round to the front door and knock, and be ad­mit­ted af­ter the man­ner of or­di­nary peo­ple; but when he was mind­ed to make him­self thor­ough­ly pleas­ant he would come and rap at the draw­ing-​room win­dow, as he was do­ing now.

‘I’ll let you in, un­cle; wait a mo­ment,’ said Lily, as she un­bolt­ed the win­dow which opened out up­on the lawn. ‘It’s dread­ful­ly cold, so come in as fast as you can.’

‘It’s not cold at all,’ said the squire. ‘It’s more like spring than any morn­ing we’ve had yet. I’ve been sit­ting with­out a fire.’

‘You won’t catch us with­out one for the next two months; will he, mam­ma? You have got a let­ter, un­cle. Is it for us to see?’

‘Well–yes; I’ve brought it down to show you. Mary, what do you think is go­ing to hap­pen?’

A ter­ri­ble idea oc­curred to Mrs Dale at that mo­ment, but she was much too wise to give it ex­pres­sion. Could it be pos­si­ble that the squire was go­ing to make a fool of him­self and get mar­ried? ‘I am very bad at guess­ing,’ said Mrs Dale. ‘You had bet­ter tell us.’

‘Bernard is go­ing to be mar­ried,’ said Lily.

‘How did you know?’ said the squire.

‘I didn’t know. I on­ly guessed.’

‘Then you’ve guessed right,’ said the squire, a lit­tle an­noyed at hav­ing his news thus tak­en out of his mouth.

‘I am so glad,’ said Mrs Dale; ‘and I know from your man­ner that you like the match.’

‘Well–yes. I don’t know the young la­dy, but I think that up­on the whole I do like it. It’s quite time, you know, that he got mar­ried.’

‘He’s not thir­ty yet,’ said Mrs Dale.

‘He will be in a month or two.’

‘And who is it, un­cle?’

‘Well;–as you’re so good at guess­ing, I sup­pose you can guess that?’

‘It’s not that Miss Par­tridge he used to talk about?’

‘No; it’s not Miss Par­tridge–I’m glad to say. I don’t be­lieve that the Par­tridges have a shilling among them.’

‘Then I sup­pose it’s an heiress,’ said Mrs Dale.

‘No; not an heiress; but she will have some mon­ey of her own. And she had con­nex­ions in Barset­shire, which makes it pleas­ant.’

‘Con­nex­ions in Barset­shire! Who can it be?’ said Lily.

‘Her name is Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble,’ said the squire, ‘and she is the niece of Miss Dun­sta­ble who mar­ried Dr Thorne and who lives at Chaldicotes.’

‘She was the wom­an who had mil­lions up­on mil­lions,’ said Lily, ‘and all got by sell­ing oint­ment.’

‘Nev­er mind how it was got,’ said the squire an­gri­ly. ‘Miss Dun­sta­ble mar­ried most re­spectably, and has al­ways made a most ex­cel­lent use of her mon­ey.’

‘And will Bernard’s wife have all her for­tune?’ asked Lily.

‘She will have twen­ty thou­sand pounds the day she mar­ries, and I sup­pose that will be all.’

‘And quite enough, too,’ said Mrs Dale.

‘It seems that old Mr Dun­sta­ble, as he was called, who, as Lily says, sold the oint­ment, quar­relled with his son or with his son’s wid­ow, and left noth­ing ei­ther to her or to her child. The moth­er is dead, and the aunt, Dr Thorne’s wife, has al­ways pro­vid­ed for the child. That’s how it is, and Bernard is go­ing to mar­ry her. They are to be mar­ried at Chaldicotes in May.’

‘I am de­light­ed to hear it,’ said Mrs Dale.

‘I’ve known Dr Thorne for the last forty years;’ and the squire now spoke in a low melan­choly tone. ‘I’ve writ­ten to him to say that the young peo­ple shall have the old place up there to them­selves if they like it.’

‘What! And turn you out?’ said Mrs Dale.

‘That would not mat­ter,’ said the squire.

‘You’d have to come and live with us,’ said Lily, tak­ing him by the hand.

‘It doesn’t mat­ter much now where I live,’ said the squire.

‘Bernard would nev­er con­sent to that,’ said Mrs Dale.

‘I won­der whether she will ask me to be a brides­maid?’ said Lily. ‘They say that Chaldicotes is such a pret­ty place, and I should see all the Barset­shire peo­ple that I’ve been hear­ing about from Grace. Poor Grace! I know that the Grantlys and the Thornes are very in­ti­mate. Fan­cy Bernard hav­ing twen­ty thou­sand pounds from the mak­ing of oint­ment!’

‘What does it mat­ter where it comes from?’ said the squire, half in anger.

‘Not in the least; on­ly it sounds so odd. I do hope she’s a nice girl.’

Then the squire pro­duced a pho­to­graph of Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble which his nephew had sent to him, and they all pro­nounced her to be very pret­ty, very much like a la­dy, and to be very good-​hu­moured. The squire was ev­ident­ly pleased with the match, and there­fore the ladies were pleased al­so. Bernard Dale was the heir to the es­tate, and his mar­riage was of course a mat­ter of mo­ment; and as on such prop­er­ties as that of Alling­ton mon­ey is al­ways want­ed, the squire may be for­giv­en for the great im­por­tance which he at­tached to the young la­dy’s for­tune. ‘Bernard could hard­ly have mar­ried pru­dent­ly with­out any mon­ey,’ he said–’un­less he had cho­sen to wait till I am gone.’

‘And then he would have been too old to mar­ry at all,’ said Lily.

But the squire’s bud­get of news had not yet been emp­tied. He told them soon af­ter­wards that he him­self had been sum­moned up to Lon­don. Bernard had writ­ten to him, beg­ging him to come and see the young la­dy; and the fam­ily lawyer had writ­ten al­so, say­ing that his pres­ence in town would be very de­sir­able. ‘It is very trou­ble­some, of course; but I shall go,’ said the squire. ‘It will do you all the good in the world,’ said Mrs Dale; ‘and of course you ought to know her per­son­al­ly be­fore the mar­riage.’ And then the squire made a clean breast of it and de­clared his full pur­pose. ‘I was think­ing that, per­haps, Lily would not ob­ject to go up to Lon­don with me.’

‘Oh, un­cle Christo­pher, I should so like it,’ said Lily.

‘If your mam­ma does not ob­ject.’

‘Mam­ma nev­er ob­jects to any­thing. I should like to see her ob­ject­ing to that!’ And Lily shook her head at her moth­er.

‘Bernard says that Miss Dun­sta­ble par­tic­ular­ly wants to see you.’

‘Does she, in­deed? And I par­tic­ular­ly want to see Miss Dun­sta­ble. How nice! Mam­ma, I don’t think I’ve ev­er been in Lon­don since I wore short frocks. Do you re­mem­ber tak­ing us to the pan­tomime? On­ly think how many years ago that is. I’m quite sure it’s time that Bernard should get mar­ried. Un­cle, I hope you’re pre­pared to take me to the play.’

‘We must see about that.’

‘And the opera, and Madame Tus­saud, and the Hor­ti­cul­tur­al Gar­dens, and the new con­juror who makes a wom­an lie up­on noth­ing. The idea of my go­ing to Lon­don! And then I sup­pose I shall be one of the brides­maids. I de­clare a new vista of life is open­ing out to me! Mam­ma, you mustn’t be dull while I’m away. It won’t be very long, I sup­pose, un­cle?’

‘About a month, prob­ably,’ said the squire.

‘Oh, mam­ma; what will you do?’

‘Nev­er mind me, Lily.’

‘You must get Bell and the chil­dren to come. But I can­not imag­ine liv­ing away from home a month. I was nev­er away from home a month in my life.’

And Lily did go up to town with her un­cle, two days on­ly af­ter hav­ing been al­lowed to her for her prepa­ra­tions. There was very much for to think of in such a jour­ney. It was not on­ly that she would see Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble who was to be her cousin’s wife, and that she would go to the play and vis­it the new con­jur­er’s en­ter­tain­ment, but that she would be in the same city both with Adol­phus Cros­bie and with John Eames. Not hav­ing per­son­al ex­pe­ri­ence of the wide­ness of Lon­don, and of the wilder­ness which it is–of the dis­tance which is set there be­tween per­sons who are not pur­pose­ly brought to­geth­er–it seemed to her fan­cy as though for this month of her ab­sence from home she would be brought in­to close con­ti­gu­ity with both her lovers. She had hith­er­to felt her­self to be at any rate safe in her fortress at Alling­ton. When Cros­bie had writ­ten to her moth­er, mak­ing a re­newed of­fer which had been re­ject­ed, Lily had felt that she cer­tain­ly need not see him un­less it pleased her to do so. He could hard­ly force him­self up­on her at Alling­ton. And as to John Eames, though he would, of course, be wel­come at Alling­ton as of­ten as he pleased to show him­self, still there was a se­cu­ri­ty in the place. She was so much at home there that she could al­ways be the mis­tress of the oc­ca­sion. She knew that she could talk to him at Alling­ton as though from ground high­er than that on which he stood him­self; but she felt that this would hard­ly be the case if she should chance to meet him in Lon­don. Cros­bie prob­ably would not come in her way. Cros­bie, she thought–and she blushed for the man she loved, as the idea came across her mind–would be afraid of meet­ing her un­cle. But John Eames would cer­tain­ly find her; and she was led by the ex­pe­ri­ence of lat­ter days to im­age that John would nev­er cross her path with­out re­new­ing his at­tempts.

But she said no word of this, even to her moth­er. She was con­tent­ed to con­fine her out­spo­ken ex­pec­ta­tions to Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble, and the play, and the con­jur­er. ‘The chances are ten to one against my lik­ing her, mam­ma,’ she said.

‘I don’t see that, my dear.’

‘I feel to be too old to think that I shall ev­er like any more new peo­ple. Three years ago I should have been quite sure that I should love a new cousin. It would have been like hav­ing a new dress. But I’ve come to think that an old dress is the most com­fort­able, and an old cousin cer­tain­ly the best.’

The squire had tak­en for them a gloomy lodg­ing in Sackville Street. Lodg­ings in Lon­don are al­ways gloomy. Gloomy colours wear bet­ter than bright ones for cur­tains and car­pets, and the keep­ers of lodg­ings in Lon­don seem to think that a cer­tain dingi­ness of ap­pear­ance is re­spectable. I nev­er saw a Lon­don lodg­ing in which any at­tempt at cheer­ful­ness had been made, and I do not think that any such at­tempt, if made, would pay. The lodg­ing-​seek­er would be fright­ened and dis­mayed, and would un­con­scious­ly be led to fan­cy that some­thing was wrong. Ideas of bur­glars and im­prop­er per­sons would present them­selves. This is so cer­tain­ly the case that I doubt whether any well-​con­di­tioned lodg­ing-​house ma­tron could be in­duced to show rooms that were pret­ti­ly draped or pleas­ant­ly coloured. The big draw­ing-​room and two large bed­rooms which the squire took were all that was prop­er, and were as brown, and as gloomy, and as ill-​suit­ed for the com­forts of or­di­nary life as though they had been pre­pared for two pris­on­ers. But Lily was not so ig­no­rant as to ex­pect cheer­ful lodg­ings in Lon­don, and was sat­is­fied. ‘And what are we to do now?’ said Lily, as soon as they found them­selves set­tled. It was still March, and what­ev­er may have been the na­ture of the weath­er at Alling­ton, it was very cold in Lon­don. They reached Sackville Street about five in the evening, and an hour was tak­en up in un­pack­ing their trunks and mak­ing them­selves as com­fort­able as their cir­cum­stances al­lowed. ‘And now what are we to do now?’ said Lily.

‘I told them to have din­ner for us at half-​past six.’

‘And what af­ter that? Won’t Bernard come to us tonight? I ex­pect­ed him to be stand­ing on the door-​steps wait­ing for us with his bride in his hand.’

‘I don’t sup­pose Bernard will be here tonight,’ said the squire. ‘He did not say that he would, and as for Miss Dun­sta­ble, I promised to take you to her aunt’s house to­mor­row.’

‘But I want­ed to see her tonight. Well;–of course brides­maids must wait up­on brides. And ladies with twen­ty thou­sand pounds can’t be ex­pect­ed to run about like com­mon peo­ple. As for Bernard–but Bernard nev­er was in a hur­ry.’ Then they dined, and when the squire had very near­ly fall­en asleep over a bot­tle of port wine which had been sent in for him from some neigh­bour­ing pub­lic-​house, Lily be­gan to feel that it was very dull. And she looked round the room, and she though that it was very ug­ly. And she cal­cu­lat­ed that thir­ty evenings so spent would seem to be very long. And she re­flect­ed that the hours were prob­ably go­ing much more quick­ly with Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble, who, no doubt, at this mo­ment had Bernard Dale by her side. And then she told her­self that the hours were not te­dious with her at home, while sit­ting with her moth­er, with all her dai­ly oc­cu­pa­tions with­in her reach. But in so telling her­self she took her­self to task, in­quir­ing of her­self whether such an as­sur­ance was al­to­geth­er true. Were not the hours some­times te­dious even at home? And in this way her mind wan­dered off to thoughts up­on life in gen­er­al, and she re­peat­ed to her­self over and over again the two words which she had told John Eames that she would write in her jour­nal. The read­er will re­mem­ber those two words–Old Maid. And she had writ­ten them in her book, mak­ing each let­ter a cap­ital, and round them she had drawn a scroll, or­na­ment­ed af­ter her own fash­ion, and she had added the date in quaint­ly formed fig­ures–for in such mat­ters Lily had some lit­tle skill and a dash of fun to di­rect it; and she had in­scribed be­low it an Ital­ian mot­to:–’Who goes soft­ly, goes safe­ly’; and above her work of art she had put a head­ing–As ar­ranged fate for L.D.’ Now she thought of all this, and re­flect­ed whether Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble was in truth very hap­py. Present­ly the tears came in­to her eyes, and she got up and went to the win­dow, as though she were afraid that her un­cle might wake and see them. And as she looked out on the blank street, she mut­tered a word or two–’Dear moth­er! Dear­est moth­er!’ Then the door was opened, and her cousin Bernard an­nounced him­self. She had not heard his knock at the door as she had been think­ing of the two words in her book.

‘What; Bernard!–ah, yes, of course,’ said the squire, rub­bing his eyes as he strove to wake him­self. ‘I wasn’t sure you would come, but I’m de­light­ed to see you. I wish you joy with all my heart–with all my heart.’

‘Of course, I should come,’ said Bernard. ‘Dear Lily, this is so good of you. Emi­ly is so de­light­ed.’ Then Lily spoke her con­grat­ula­tions warm­ly, and there was no trace of a tear in her eyes, and she was thor­ough­ly hap­py as she sat by her cousin’s side, and lis­tened to his rap­tures about Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble. ‘And you will be so fond of her aunt,’ he said.

‘But is she not aw­ful­ly rich?’ said Lily.

‘Fright­ful­ly rich,’ said Bernard; ‘but re­al­ly you would hard­ly find it out if no­body told you. Of course she lives in a big house, and has a heap of ser­vants; but she can’t help that.’

‘I hate a heap of ser­vants,’ said Lily.

Then there came an­oth­er knock at the door, and who should en­ter the room but John Eames. Lily for a mo­ment was tak­en aback, but it was on­ly for a mo­ment. She had been think­ing so much of him that his pres­ence dis­turbed her for an in­stant. ‘He prob­ably will not know that I am here,’ she had said to her­self; but she had not yet been three hours in Lon­don, and he was al­ready with her! At first he hard­ly spoke to her, ad­dress­ing him­self to the squire. ‘La­dy Ju­lia told me you were to be here, and as I start for the Con­ti­nent ear­ly to­mor­row morn­ing, I thought you would let me come and see you be­fore I went.’

‘I’m al­ways glad to see you, John,’ said the squire–’very glad. And so you are go­ing abroad, are you?’

Then John­ny con­grat­ulat­ed his old ac­quain­tance, Bernard Dale, as to his com­ing mar­riage, and ex­plained to them how La­dy Ju­lia in one of her let­ters had told him all about it, and had even giv­en him the num­ber in Sackville Street. ‘I sup­pose she learned it from you, Lily,’ said the squire. ‘Yes un­cle, she did.’ And then there came ques­tions as to John’s pro­ject­ed jour­ney to the Con­ti­nent, and he ex­plained that he was go­ing on law-​busi­ness, on be­half of Mr Craw­ley, to catch the dean and Mrs Ara­bin, if it might be pos­si­ble. ‘You see, sir, Mr Too­good, who is Mr Craw­ley’s cousin, and al­so his lawyer, is my cousin too; and that’s why I’m go­ing.’ And still there had been hard­ly a word spo­ken be­tween him and Lily.

‘But you’re not a lawyer, John; are you?’ said the squire.

‘No. I’m not a lawyer my­self.’

‘Nor a lawyer’s clerk?’

‘Cer­tain­ly not a lawyer’s clerk,’ said John, laugh­ing.

‘Then why should you go?’ asked Bernard Dale.

Then John­ny had to ex­plain, and in do­ing so he be­came very elo­quent as to the hard­ships of Mr Craw­ley’s case. ‘You see, sir, no­body can pos­si­bly be­lieve that such a man as that stole twen­ty pounds.’

‘I do not for one,’ said Lily.

‘God for­bid that I should say he did,’ said the squire.

‘I’m quite sure he didn’t,’ said John­ny, warm­ing to his sub­ject. ‘It couldn’t be that such a man as that should be­come a thief all at once. It’s not hu­man na­ture, sir; is it?’

‘It’s very hard to know what hu­man na­ture is,’ said the squire.

‘It’s the gen­er­al opin­ion down in Barset­shire that he did steal it,’ said Bernard. ‘Dr Thorne was one of the mag­is­trates who com­mit­ted him, and I know he thinks so.’

‘I don’t blame the mag­is­trates in the least,’ said John­ny.

‘That’s kind of you,’ said the squire.

‘Of course you’ll laugh at me, sir; but you’ll see that we shall come out right. There’s some mys­tery in it of which we haven’t got at the bot­tom as yet; and if there is any­body that can help us it is the dean.’

‘If the dean knows any­thing, why has he not writ­ten and told what he knows?’ said the squire.

‘That’s what I can’t say. The dean has not had an op­por­tu­ni­ty of writ­ing since he heard–even if he has yet heard–that Mr Craw­ley is to be tried. And then he and Mrs Ara­bin are not to­geth­er. It’s a long sto­ry, and I will not trou­ble you with it all; but at any rate I’m go­ing off to­mor­row. Lily, can I do any­thing for you in Flo­rence?’

‘In Flo­rence?’ said Lily; ‘and are you re­al­ly go­ing to Flo­rence? How I en­vy you.’

‘And who pays your ex­pens­es,’ said the squire.

‘Well;–as to my ex­pens­es, they are to be paid by a per­son who won’t raise any un­pleas­ant ques­tions about the amount.’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said the squire.

‘He means him­self,’ said Lily.

‘I’m go­ing to have a trip for my own fun,’ said John­ny, ‘and I shall pick up ev­idence on the road, as I’m go­ing–that’s all.’

Then Lily be­gan to take an ac­tive part in the con­ver­sa­tion, and a great deal was said about Mr Craw­ley, and about Grace, and Lily de­clared that she would be very anx­ious to hear any news which John Eames might be able to send. ‘You know, John, how fond we are of your cousin Grace, at Alling­ton? Are we not, un­cle?’

‘Yes, in­deed,’ said the squire. ‘I thought her a very nice girl.’

‘If you should be able to learn any­thing that may be of use, John, how hap­py you will be.’

‘Yes, I shall,’ said John.

‘And I think it’s so good of you to go, John. But it is just like you. You were al­ways gen­er­ous.’ Soon af­ter that he got up and went. It was very clear to him that he would have no mo­ment in which to say a word alone to Lily; and if he could find such a mo­ment, what good would such a word do him? It was as yet but a few weeks since she had pos­itive­ly re­fused him. And he too re­mem­bered very well those two words which she had told him she would write in her book. As he had been com­ing to the house he had told him­self that his com­ing would be–could be of no use. And yet he was dis­ap­point­ed with the re­sult of his vis­it, al­though she had spo­ken to him so sweet­ly.

‘I sup­pose you’ll be gone when I get back,’ he said.

‘We shall be here a month,’ said the squire.

‘I shall be back long be­fore that, I hope,’ said John­ny. ‘Good-​bye, sir. Good-​bye, Dale. Good-​bye, Lily.’ And he put out his hand to her.

‘Good-​bye, John.’ And then she added, al­most in a whis­per. ‘I think you are very, very right to go.’ How could he fail af­ter that to hope as he walked home that she might still re­lent. And she al­so thought much of him, but her thoughts of him made her cling more firm­ly than ev­er to those two words. She could not bring her­self to mar­ry him; but, at least, she would not break his heart by be­com­ing the wife of any­one else. Soon af­ter this Bernard Dale went al­so. I am not sure that he had been well pleased at see­ing John Eames be­come sud­den­ly the hero of the hour. When a young man is go­ing to per­form so im­por­tant an act as mar­riage he is apt to think that he ought to be the hero of the hour him­self–at any rate among his own fam­ily.

Ear­ly on the next morn­ing Lily was tak­en by her un­cle to call up­on Mrs Thorne, and to see Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble. Bernard was to meet them there, but it had been ar­ranged that they should reach the house first. ‘There is noth­ing so ab­surd as these in­tro­duc­tions,’ Bernard had said. ‘You go and look at her, and when you’ve had time to look at her, then I’ll come!’ So the squire and Lily went off to look at Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble.

‘You don’t mean to say that she lives in that house?’ said Lily, when the cab was stopped be­fore an enor­mous man­sion in one of the most fash­ion­able of the Lon­don squares.

‘I be­lieve she does,’ said the squire.

‘I nev­er shall be able to speak to any­body liv­ing in such a house as that,’ said Lily. ‘A duke couldn’t have any­thing grander.’

‘Mrs Thorne is rich­er than half the dukes,’ said the squire. Then the door was opened by a porter, and Lily found her­self with­in the hall. Ev­ery­thing was very great, and very mag­nif­icent, and, as she thought, very un­com­fort­able. Present­ly she heard a loud jovial voice on the stairs. ‘Mr Dale, I’m de­light­ed to see you. And this is your niece Lily. Come up, my dear. There is a young wom­an up­stairs dy­ing to em­brace you. Nev­er mind the um­brel­la. Put it down any­where. I want to have a look at you, be­cause Bernard swears that you’re so pret­ty.’ This was Mrs Thorne, once Miss Dun­sta­ble, the rich­est wom­an in Eng­land, and the aunt of Bernard’s bride. The read­er may per­haps re­mem­ber the ad­vice which she once gave to Ma­jor Grant­ly, and her en­thu­si­asm on that oc­ca­sion. ‘There she is, Mr Dale; what do you think of her?’ said Mrs Thorne as she opened the door of a small sit­ting-​room wedged in be­tween two large sa­loons, in which Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble was sit­ting.

‘Aunt Martha, how can you be so ridicu­lous?’ said the young la­dy.

‘I sup­pose it is ridicu­lous to ask the ques­tion to which one re­al­ly wants to have an an­swer,’ said Mrs Thorne. ‘But Mr Dale has, in truth, come to in­spect you, and to form an opin­ion; and, in hon­est truth, I shall be very anx­ious to know what he thinks–though, of course, he won’t tell me.’

The old man took the girl in his arms, and kissed her on both cheeks. ‘I have no doubt you will find out what I think,’ he said, ‘though I should nev­er tell you.’

‘I gen­er­al­ly do find out what peo­ple think,’ she said. ‘And so you’re Lily Dale?’

‘Yes, I’m Lily Dale.’

‘I have so of­ten heard of you, par­tic­ular­ly of late; for you must know that a cer­tain Ma­jor Grant­ly is a friend of mine. We must take care that that af­fair comes off all right, must we not?’

‘I hope it will.’ Then Lily turned to Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble, and, tak­ing her hand, went up and sat be­side her, while Mrs Thorne and the squire talked of the com­ing mar­riage. ‘How long have you been en­gaged?’ said Lily.

‘Re­al­ly en­gaged about three weeks. I think it is not more than three weeks ago.’

‘How very dis­creet Bernard has been. He nev­er said a word about it while it was go­ing on.’

‘Men nev­er do tell, I sup­pose,’ said Emi­ly Dun­sta­ble.

‘Of course you love him dear­ly?’ said Lily, not know­ing what else to say.

‘Of course I do.’

‘And so do we. You know he’s al­most a broth­er to us; that is, to me and my sis­ter. We nev­er had a broth­er of our own.’ And so the morn­ing was passed till Lily was told by her un­cle to come away, and was told al­so by Mrs Thorne that she was to dine with them in the square on that day. ‘You must not be sur­prised that my hus­band is not here,’ she said. ‘He’s a very odd sort of man, and he nev­er comes to Lon­don if he can help it.’