Their conversation faded before they reached North Hill House, and then, as they entered the drive, Raymond reminded Estelle of a time long vanished and an expedition taken when she was a child.

"Talking of good things, d'you remember our walk to Chilcombe in the year one? Or, to be more exact, when you were in short frocks."

"I remember well enough. How my chatter must have bored you."

"You never bored me in your life, Chicky. In fact, you always seem to have been a part of my life since I began to live. That event happened soon after our walk, if I remember rightly. You really seem as much a part of my life as my right hand, Estelle."

"Well, your right hand can't bore you, certainly."

"Some of the things that it has done have bored me. But let's go to Chilcombe again--not in the car--but just tramp it as we did before. How often have you been there since we went?"

She considered.

"Twice, I think. My friends there left ten years ago and my girl friend died. I haven't been there since I grew up."

"Well, come this afternoon."

"It's going to rain, Ray."

"Since when did rain frighten you?"

"I'd love to come."

"A walk will do me good," he said. "I'm getting jolly lazy."

"So father thinks. He hates motors--says they are going to make the next generation flabby and good-for-nothing."

They started presently under low grey clouds, but the sky was not grey for them and the weather of their minds made them forget the poor light and sad south-west wind laden with rain. It held off until they had reached Chilcombe chapel, entered the little place of prayer and stood together before the ancient reredos. The golden-brown wood made a patch of brightness in the little building. They were looking at it and recalling Estelle's description of it in the past, when the storm broke and the rain beat on the white gla.s.s in the windows above them.

"How tiny it's all grown," said Estelle. "Surely everything has shrunk?"

They had the chapel to themselves and, sitting beside her in a pew, Raymond asked her to marry him. Thunder had wakened in the sky, and the glare of lightning touched their faces now and then. But they only remembered that afterwards.

"Sally Groves was no more than half right," he said, "so her fame for wisdom is shaken. She told us we didn't know we loved one another, Estelle. But I know I love you well enough, and I've been shaking in my shoes to tell you so for months and months. I knew I was getting too old every minute and yet couldn't say the word. But I must say it now at any cost. Chicky, I love you--dearly, dearly I love you--because I'm calm and steady, that doesn't mean I'm not in a blaze inside. I never thought of it even while you were growing up. But a time came when I did begin to think of it like the deuce; and when once I did, the thought towered up like the effreet let out of the bottle--that story you loved when you were small. But my only fear and dread is that you've always been accustomed to think of me as so much older than you are. If you once get an idea into your head about a person's age, you can't get it out again.

At least, I can't; so I'm afraid you'll regard me as quite out of the question for a husband. If that's so, I'll begin over again."

Her eyes were round and her mouth a little open. She did not blink when the lightning flashed.

"But--but--" she said.

"If I'm not too old, there are no 'buts' left," he declared firmly. "Ten years is no great matter after all, and from the point of view of brains, I'm an infant beside you. Then say 'yes,' my darling--say 'yes'

to me."

"I wonder--I wonder, Ray?"

"Haven't you ever guessed what I felt?"

"Yes, in a vague way. At least I knew there was something growing up between us."

"It was love, my beautiful dear."

She smiled at him doubtfully. The colour had come back to her face, but she did not respond when he lifted his arms to her.

"Are you sure--can you be sure, Ray? It's so different,--so shattering.

It seems to smash up all the past into little bits and begin the world all over again--for you and me. It's such a near thing. I've seen the married people and wondered about it. You might get so weary of always having me so close."

"I want you close--closer and closer. I want you as the best part of myself--to make me happier first and, because happier, more useful in the world. I want you at the helm of my life--to steer me, Chicky. What couldn't we do together! It's selfish--? it's one-sided, I know that. I get everything--you only get me. But I'll try and rise to the occasion.

I worship you, and no woman ever had a more devout worshipper. I feel that your father wouldn't be very mad with me. But it's for you to decide, nothing else matters either way."

"I love to think you care for me so much," she said. "And I care for you, Ray, and have cared for you--more than either of us know. Yes, I have. Sally Groves knew somehow. I should like to say 'yes' this moment; but I can't. I know I shall say it presently; but I'm not going to say it till I've thought a great many thoughts and looked into the future and considered all this means--for you as well as for me. It's life or death really, for both of us, and the more certain sure we are before, the happier we should be afterwards, I expect."

"I'm sure enough, Estelle. I've been sure enough for many a long day. I know the very hour I began to be sure."

"I think I am too; but I can't say 'yes' and mean 'yes' for the present.

I've got to thresh out a lot of things. I dare say they'd be absurd to you; but they're not to me."

"Can I help you?"

"I don't know. You can, I expect. I shall come to you again to throw light on the difficult points."

"How long are you going to take?"

"How can I tell? But I _can_ all the same, I'm not going to take long."

"Say you love me--do say that."

"I should have told you if I didn't."

"That's all right, but not so blessed as hearing you say with your own lips you do. Say it--say it, Chicky. I won't take advantage of it. I only want to hear it. Then I'll leave you in peace to think your thoughts."

"I do love you," she said gently and steadily. "It can be nothing smaller than that. You are a very great part of my life--the greatest. I know that, because when you go away life is at evening, and when you come back again life is at morning. Let me have a little time, Ray--only a very little. Then I'll decide."

"I hope your wisdom will let you follow your will, then, and not forbid the banns."

"You mustn't think it cold and horrid of me."

"You couldn't be cold and horrid, my sweet Estelle. We're neither of us capable of being cold, or horrid. We are not babies. I don't blame you a bit for wanting to think about it. I only blame myself. If I was all I might have been, you wouldn't want to think about it."

This challenge shook her, but did not change her.

"n.o.body's all they might be, Ray; but many people are a great deal more than they might be. That's what makes you love people best, I think--to see how brave and patient and splendid men and women can be. Life's so difficult even for the luckiest of us; but it isn't the luckiest who are the pluckiest generally--is it? I've had such a lot more than my share of luck already. So have you--at least people think so. But n.o.body knows one's luck really except oneself."

"It's the things that are going to happen will make our good luck," he said. "You'll find men are seldom satisfied with the past, whatever women may be. G.o.d knows I'm not."

"You were always one of my two heroes when I was a child; and father was the other. He is still my hero--and so are you, Ray."

"A pretty poor hero. I wouldn't pretend that to my dog. I only claim to have something worth while in me that you might bring out--raw material for you to turn into the finished article."

She laughed to hear this.