"Oh, I don't think I could do that." She spoke uncertainly, and yet even he could see that she was startled, surprised, and yes, pleased. "Oh, yes, you can!" Rose came forward with the poor lady's hat and black lace cloak. Very gently, but with the husband's strong arm gripping the wife's rather tightly, they between them led her out of the front door into the Close. "I think," said Sir John mildly, "that you had better run back and get your hat, Rose." She left them, and Sir John Blake, letting go of his wife's arm looked down into her poor blurred face for a moment. "That girl," he said hoarsely, "sets us both an example, Janey." "That's true," she whispered, "But John?" "Yes." "Don't you sometimes feel dreadfully _jealous_ of her?" "I? God bless my soul, _no_!" But a very sweet smile, a smile she had not seen shed on her for many, many years, lit up his face. "We'll have to think more of one another, and less of the boy--eh, my dear?" Lady Blake was too surprised to speak--and so, for once doing the wise thing, she remained silent. Rose, hurrying out a moment later, saw that the open air had already done them both good. CHAPTER XXIV "You've got to make him believe that you wish for the marriage to take place now, for your own sake, not for his." It was with those words, uttered by Sir Jacques Robey, still sounding in her ears, that Rose Otway walked up to the door of the room where Jervis Blake, having just seen his father, was now waiting to see her. Sir John Blake's brief "He has taken it very well. He has a far greater sense of discipline than I had at his age," had been belied, discounted, by the speaker's own look of suffering and of revolt. Rose waited outside the door for a few moments. She was torn with conflicting fears and emotions. A strange feeling of oppression and shyness had come over her. It had seemed so easy to say that she would be married at once, to-morrow, to Jervis. But she had not known that she would have to ask Jervis's consent. She had supposed, foolishly, that it would all be settled for her by Sir Jacques.... At last she turned the handle of the door, and walked through into the room. And then, to her unutterable relief, she saw that Jervis looked exactly as usual, except that his face, instead of being pale, as it had been the last few days, was rather flushed. Words which had been spoken to him less than five minutes ago were also echoing in Jervis's brain, pushing everything else into the background. He had said, "I suppose you think that I ought to offer to release Rose?" and his father had answered slowly: "All I can say is that I should do so--if I were in your place."