“I see you two are quite agreed,” laughed Harrie. “Marvellous union, Mrs. Locke Harper. You'll be really a pattern couple soon, and throw Duke and me cruelly in the shade. Now, dress like lightning, and I'll drive you and the children over to grandpapa's. Most likely well meet Pa and Nathanael somewhere about the town.” But, with the general vagueness of the Dugdale habits, that meeting did not arrive, nor was Mr. Harper anywhere to be seen. “I dare say he is at the cottage, where I was bid not to take you upon any account. Charming little mysteries, I suppose, attendant on bringing home the bride. Very nice. Heigh-ho! I remember how happy I was when my poor dear Duke brought me home for the first time!” “Where was that?” They were dashing over the moors, Agatha sitting rather silent, and Harrie's tongue galloping as fast as Dunce, her steed. Little Brian was perched on his mother's knee, holding the reins--a baby Phaeton, though with small danger of setting the world on fire--at least just yet. “Where was it, my dear? Why, to the same old house we live in, empty and gloomy then, though it's full enough now. And I had been married--(hold your tongues, Fred and Gus! you can't have the whip, simpletons!)--married only three weeks, and it was queer coming back to my native place; and my father was rather cross that I had married Duke at all, and--I was foolish enough to cry.” Here Harrie laughed, and gave Dunce a lash that quite discomposed his pony faculties, and made Brian scream with delight. “And what did your husband say?” “Say? Nothing. He never speaks when he's vexed or hurt; only, a little while afterwards he came beside me, and said something about my being such a young girl, so gay-hearted and pretty--(bah!--though I was pretty then)--too young, he said, to marry such an elderly man, etc. etc. etc.” “And what did _you_ say?” “Likewise nothing. I just jumped on his knee, and took him round the neck, and--But that isn't of the slightest consequence to anybody. Tuts! On with you, Dunce!” And Harrie leaned forward, her eyelashes glittering wet in spite of her fun. “I know I don't deserve him,” she continued. “I never did. Nobody could. There are a lot of bad men in the world, but when a man is really good, there's hardly a woman alive that is good enough for him. And I'm not half good enough for Duke--but--I love him! That's all. Bless thee, Brian! thee is Pa's own boy all over!” And Harrie kissed the little fellow passionately, with something more even than a mother's love.--Agatha could have lifted up her arms and shrieked with misery. It was a strange long day at Kingcombe Holm; many things to be arranged, many questions to be parried, many prying eyes to be avoided. But the general conclusion seemed to be, that this sudden movement was a mysterious whim of Nathanael--and Nathanael was supposed by one-half of his family to be mightily prone to mysteries and whims.