"Yes."

"On your honour as a man, is that true?"

"Yes."

Then she took his right hand in her two hands, and held it tightly.

"Gentlemen--listen to me, please;" and she spoke with feverish resolution. "This is not perhaps an opportune moment for making the announcement--but I want you to know, I want all my friends to know without further delay that Mr. Marsden and I are engaged to be married."

Silence like a dead weight seemed to fall upon the room.

Enid had uttered a half-stifled exclamation of horror, but blank amazement rendered the guests dumb. Mr. Prentice, who had become apoplectically red, opened and shut his mouth; but no sound issued from it. Mr. Mears, with bowed head and heavily hanging arms, stared at the carpet. Gradually every eye sank, and all were staring downwards--as if unable to support the sight of the couple who stood hand in hand before them.

At last Mr. Ridgway tried to say something; and then Mr. Fentiman feebly echoed his words.

"You have taken our breath away, madam. But it behoves us to--ah--congratu--to felicitate."

"Or to proffer our good wishes."

"And our best hopes."

But Mrs. Thompson did not look at them or listen to them. Marsden was speaking to her in a low voice.

"Yes, yes, yes. Every word. Every word. I meant all I said then--and I mean it a thousand times more now. You are making me the proudest of mortals--but don't forget one thing."

"What?"

"Why, all I said about the difficulties--the, the inequality of our position, which must somehow be got rid of. But of course you've thought it out."

"What do you mean?" She was gazing at him with love and admiration; but an intense anxiety came into her eyes.

"Well, I mean exactly what I said then. Nothing can change my mind. But, as I told you, I can't have all the world pointing at me as a penniless adventurer who has caught a rich wife.... But you've planned--you mean to prevent--"

His eyes did not meet hers. She dropped his hand, and looked at him now with a pa.s.sionate, yearning intentness.

"Go on--quickly. Say what it is that you mean."

"I mean, it is to be a thorough partnership--husband and wife on an equal footing. You mean it, too, don't you? Partners in love and partners in everything else!"

"Yes," she said, after a scarcely perceptible hesitation. "I did mean that. You have antic.i.p.ated what I intended."

"My sweetheart and my wife." As he whispered the words, her whole face lit up with triumphant joy. "I knew that you meant it all along. And I'm the happiest proudest man that ever lived.... Now you'd better tell them. Let them know that, too."

Again she hesitated. She was in a fever of excitement, with all real thought obliterated by the flood of emotion; and yet perhaps already, though unconsciously to herself, she had attained a complete knowledge of the fatal nature of her mistake.

"Do you want me to tell them now--at once?"

"Yes," he said gaily. "No time like the present. Let them know how my dear wife and I mean to stand--and then there'll be nothing for anybody to chatter about."

"Very well."

"That's right;" and he gently drew her round towards her audience.

"That's _our_ way--side by side, shoulder to shoulder, you and I, facing the world."

"Gentlemen," said Mrs. Thompson firmly, "there's another thing that I must add to what I have said. Mr. Marsden, when he comes into this house as my husband, will come into the business as my partner."

Marsden, with his head raised and his shoulders squared, stood boldly smiling at the silent men.

XI

She was conscious that the whole world had turned against her; in every face she could read her condemnation; when she drove through High Street she felt like a deposed monarch--hats were still removed, but with pitying courtesy instead of with loyal fervour. Constraint and embarra.s.sment sounded in every fresh voice to which she listened. Mr.

Prentice, taking her instructions, a.s.sumed a ridiculously hollow cheerfulness, as if he had been speaking to somebody who had contracted an incurable disease. The shop staff dared not look at her, and yet could not look away from her with any air of naturalness; up and down the counters male and female a.s.sistants, so soon as she appeared, became preposterously busy; and she knew that they avoided meeting her eyes.

She knew also that the moment she had pa.s.sed, their eyes followed her--they were at once frightened and fascinated, as if she had been a person who had confessed to a great crime, who was still at large, but who would be arrested almost immediately.

During the first few days of her engagement she suffered under the heavy sense that every friend had abandoned her. In street, shop, or house, she could find no comforter. Even Yates was cruel.

"Why do you look so glum?" At last she roundly upbraided Yates. "Don't wait upon me at all, if you can only do it as though you were going to a funeral."

Yates, in sorrowful tones said that her glumness was caused by her thoughts.

Then Mrs. Thompson piteously prayed for support from the old servant.

"Are you going to drive me mad among you--make me commit suicide? Oh, Yates, do stand by me."

And Yates wept, and swore that henceforth she would stand by her mistress.

"Say you think I'm right in what I'm doing."

"I'll say this, ma'am--that no one should be the judge except you of what's right. No one hasn't any qualification to interfere with you in what you please to do."

"But, Yates, say you approve of it."

"Well then, I do say it."

Yates said that she approved; but no one else said so. Enid did not pretend to approve--although she talked very little about her mother's plans. She had obtained the desire of her own heart; she and Mr. Kenion were to be made one as soon as possible; she was buying her trousseau, and Mr. Prentice was drawing the marriage settlement.

Both marriages were to be pushed on rapidly. No time like the present, as Marsden joyously declared. "What's the good of waiting, when you have made up your mind?" But Enid was to be cleared out of the way first; and not till Enid had left the little house could her mother throw herself completely into her own dream of bliss.

There were some trifling difficulties, some slight delays. Mr. Kenion, as one about to become a member of the family, frankly confessed that he viewed the Marsden alliance with repugnance. He told Mr. Prentice that it altered the whole condition of affairs, that his relatives begged him to stand out for a much more liberal settlement than would previously have appeared to be ample; and he hinted on his own account that if Mrs.

Thompson didn't stump up, he would feel justified in withdrawing altogether. Mr. Prentice, however, made short work of this suitor's questionings and threatenings. He did not mention that, on the strong advice of Mr. Marsden, his client had largely cut down the proposed amount; but he said that in his own opinion the settlement was quite ample.

"Of course," said Kenion, "what we get now is all we shall ever get. I don't value Enid's further expectations at a bra.s.s farthing."

"That's as it may be. Possibly you are wise in not building on the future. But my instructions merely concern the present. As to the amount decided on by my client, whether big or little--well, it is to take or leave."