thegirl's, as she waited quietly in the silent dusk with a heart whichthumped so violently that it seemed to her he must hear its rapid beat.
"It appears to me preposterous," he said, in a voice which held a ringof wonder in its tones, "that I, so much older than you, so unsuited inevery sense, should find the courage to tell you how greatly I love you.It is scarcely to be expected that you can care for me sufficiently toallow me any hope... And yet... Miss Annersley, am I toopresumptuous?"
"No," Peggy whispered. She slipped a hand shyly into his and laughedsoftly. "I think you have discovered the best way of settling theownership of our dog," she said.
"I am not thinking of the dog," he answered, bending over her.
"I wasn't thinking of the dog either," she replied.
With her hand still in John Musgrave's she walked to the parapet and satdown. Mr Musgrave seated himself beside her, and, gaining courage fromthe contact of the warm hand lying so confidingly in his own, he feltemboldened to proceed with his avowal of love.
"My feeling for you, Miss Annersley, is as unchangeable as it is deep.It has developed so imperceptibly that, until you went away, and Irealised how greatly I missed you, what a blank in my days your absencemade, I never suspected how dear you were becoming to me. When Isuspected it I was distressed, because it seemed to me incredible thatyou, young and beautiful and so greatly admired, could ever entertainfor me any kinder feeling than that of friendship. I can scarcelybelieve even now that you feel more than friendship for me. I mustappear old to you, and my ideas are old-fashioned, and, I begin to seenow, intolerant."
"Not intolerant," Peggy corrected. "If I wasn't confident that yourheart is so kind, and your sympathies so wide, that it will be as easyfor you to give and take as for me to meet you in this respect, I shouldbe afraid to risk the happiness of both our futures. But I haven't anyfears at all. I think I have loved you from the moment when you met meweeping in the road, and took charge of Diogenes."
"That," he said a little doubtfully, "is gratitude."
She shook her head.
"No," she insisted, "it is something more enduring than that."
At which interesting point in the discussion, to John Musgrave'sannoyance, a shrill scream penetrated the stillness, and Mrs Chadwick'svoice was heard exclaiming in accents of astonishment and delight:
"Oh, Diogenes, Diogenes, dear old fellow!... Wherever did you comefrom? And how did you get your coat in that horrible mess?"
Diogenes, finding it slow on the terrace, had sauntered into thedrawing-room and discovered himself to Mrs Chadwick.
Peggy glanced swiftly into the face of the man beside her and laughedhappily, and John Musgrave, finding to his vast amazement the laughingface held firmly between his two hands, bent his head suddenly andkissed the curving lips.
It is possible that could he have looked back into the days before heknew Peggy he would have failed to recognise as himself the man who, inresponse to the vicar's assertion that occasionally people married forlove, had made the shocked ejaculation: "Do they, indeed?" JohnMusgrave was learning.
CHAPTER THIRTY.
The Rev Walter Errol, removing, his surplice in the little vestry atthe finish of one of the simplest and most pleasing ceremonies at whichhe had ever been required to officiate, looked forth through themullioned window to watch his oldest and best-loved friend passing alongthe gravelled path in the sunlight with his bride upon his arm.
The sight of John Musgrave married gave him greater satisfaction thananything that had befallen since his own happy marriage-day. The onething lacking to make his friend the most lovable of men was supplied inthe newly-made contract which bound him for good and ill to the woman athis side. There would be, in the vicar's opinion, so much of good inthe union that ill would be crowded out and find no place in the livesof this well-assorted pair, who, during the brief period of theirengagement, had practised so successfully that deference to each other'sopinions which smooths away difficulties and prevents a dissimilarity inideas from approaching disagreement. The future happiness of Mr andMrs John Musgrave was based on the sure foundation of mutual respect.
While the vicar stood at the window, arrested in the business ofdisrobing by the engrossment of his thoughts, Robert, having finishedrolling up the red carpet in the aisle, entered the vestry andapproached the window and stood, as he so often did, at the vicar'selbow, and gazed also after the newly-married couple, a frown knittinghis heavy brows, and, notwithstanding the handsome fee in his pocket, anexpression of most unmistakable contempt in his eyes as they rested uponthe bridegroom.
"They be done for, sir," he said, with a gloomy jerk of the head in thedirection of the vanishing pair.
The vicar turned his face towards the speaker, the old whimsical smilelighting his features.
"Not done for, Robert. They are just beginning life," he said.
"They be done for," Robert persisted obstinately, and stared at the openregister which John Musgrave and his wife had signed. "Ay, they be donefor."
"When you married Hannah were you done for?" the vicar inquired.
"Yes, sir, I were," Robert answered with sour conviction.
It passed through Walter Errol's mind to wonder whether the non-successof Robert's marital relations was due solely to Hannah's fault.
"How came you to marry Hannah?" he asked.
"Did I never tell you 'ow that came about?" Robert said. "I didn' gowi' Hannah, not first along. I went wi' a young woman from Cross-ways.Me an' 'er had been walking out for a goodish while when 'er says to meone night, `Will 'ee come in a-Toosday?' I says, `Yes, I will.' Well,sir, you never seed rain like it rained that Toosday. I wasn't goin' toget into my best clothes to go out there an' get soaked to the skin in;so I brushed myself up as I was, an' changed my boots; an' when I gotout 'er turned up 'er nose at me. So I went straight off an' took upwith Hannah."
"I think," observed the vicar, "that you were a little hasty."
"I've thought so since, sir," Robert admitted. "The mistake I made wasin 'avin' further truck wi' any of them. Leave the wimmin alone, Isays, if you want to be comfortable. A man when 'e marries is donefor."
Walter Errol, having finished disrobing, took his soft hat and went outto the motor, which had returned from the Hall to fetch him, and wasdriven swiftly to the scene of the festivities, the joyous pealing ofthe bells sounding harmoniously in the lazy stillness of the summer day.Past John Musgrave's home the motor bore him; past Miss Simpson'scomfortable house, where the blinds were jealously lowered as though afuneral, instead of a wedding, were in progress. And, indeed, for theMoresby spinster the chiming of the marriage-peal was as the funeralknell ringing the last rites over the grave of her dead hopes. MissSimpson was the only person in Moresby who sympathised with the sexton'sopinion that John Musgrave was done for.
At the Hall only the immediate members of both families were present,with the exception of the vicar and his wife. John Musgrave hadstipulated for a quiet wedding. Very proud and happy he looked as, withhis wife beside him, he greeted his oldest friend; and the vicar, withan affectionate hand on his shoulder, exclaimed:
"It isn't Coelebs any longer, John. You were a wise man and waitedpatiently for the right woman."
"I hope I shall prove to be the right woman, John," Peggy whispered,drawing more closely to him as the vicar passed on, and looking up inher husband's face with wide, diffident grey eyes, eyes that were wellsof happiness, despite their anxious questioning.
"My only doubt," John Musgrave answered gently, "is whether I shallprove worthy of your love, my wife."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The End.
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Coelebs: The Love Story of a Bachelor Page 38