"Nothing whatever to me, darling. Don't be silly," he said tenderly. "It's only father's nonsense. He thinks so much of his name because it's a fossilised old concern which has been in the county since Noah. He doesn't want me to marry you, only because he's afraid your people may not have lived about here since Noah. If you went and told him you're a Raleigh or a Cruwys he would lay his pedigree at your feet and ask you to roll on it." "Not well-born. No name," said Boodles, aloud this time. "I think we have been silly babies. I seem to have grown up all at once. Oh, Aubrey, was it you and I who used to walk here--years ago?" He bent and took her face between his hands and kissed the pretty head. "We never bothered about names," sobbed Boodles. "We are not bothering now--at least I'm not. It's all the same to me, darling." "It's not. It can't be. How silly I was not to see it before. If your parents say I'm not--not your equal, you mustn't love me any more. You must go away and forget me. But what am I to do? I can't forget you," she said. "It's not like living in a town, where you see people always passing--living as I do, on the moor, alone with a poor old man who imagines horrors." "Listen, darling." Aubrey was only a boy, and he was nearly crying too. "I'm not going to give you up. I'll tell you the whole truth. My people wanted me not to see you again, but I shall tell them that things have gone too far with us. They won't like it at first, but they must get to like it. I shall write to you every week while I am away, and when I come back I shall tell father we must be married." "I wouldn't, not without his consent. I shall go on loving you because I cannot help it, but I won't marry you unless he tells me I may." "Well, I will make him," said Aubrey. "I know how to appeal to him. I shall tell him I have loved you ever since you were a child, and we were promised to each other then, and we have renewed the promise nearly every year since."