‘Perhaps,’ said Florence, coming to her sister’s aid; ‘that is the way in France, the parents arrange it all. I shouldn’t mind at all--that. I give my consent. It would be nice to be the bride’s relations and always about the house. If you’ll promise to ask nice people and always us to meet them--and be kind about sending the carriage for us, and that sort of thing, for papa hates a bill for flys--I shall give my consent.’ ‘Me!’ cried Mab, indignant, ‘I would not marry Leo Swinford, not if---- I’d rather marry the silliest of the curates. I’d rather----’ She stopped short breathless, unable to find a stronger alternative. ‘Then what a good thing for you,’ said Florry, ‘that he doesn’t want a wife!’ ‘If you think it is nice,’ said Emily, ‘for young girls to talk about gentlemen, and whether they want wives or not, as if wives were sold at the shop at so much a pound--I am not of that kind of mind: and Aunt Emily would not like it any more than mamma. Good-bye, you two. I have got to go home and get ready, whatever you may have to do.’ And thus Emily retired with the honours of war. If there was any one who had formed plans on the subject of Leo Swinford it was she; not plans, indeed, which are dreadful foreign things, but just a floating idea such as an English girl might entertain, that if a young man and a young woman are thrown much together, why, then certain consequences might follow. One never could tell what might happen, as Mrs. Plowden herself, who was the very essence of propriety, did not hesitate to say. IV The road was a little muddy, but not much; and it was quite possible by taking a little trouble in walking to keep your boots quite clean. Under the trees in the avenue this was not so easy, for it was more sheltered, and the wind could not get in to sweep through and through every opening. There is a pond, or lake, in the grounds, as everybody knows, which had been the delight of the neighbourhood for the skating in winter, all the long time the Swinfords had been absent. ‘I wonder if they will still let us skate now they are at home,’ said Emily, as they walked round the bank over the crisped and extremely living water, which did not look under the breeze as if it had ever been bound by chains of frost. ‘Winter is a long way off,’ said Mrs. Plowden, who was a little blown by her walk. She desired her companions to pause a little and look at the view. ‘I don’t want,’ she said, panting, ‘to go in out of breath. These sort of people have quite advantage enough over one in their fine houses without going in panting like a washer-woman.’ She added, ‘Winter’s a long way off, and, as we never knew whether they gave permission at all, or if it was only Howell at the gate, I wouldn’t say anything about it, Emmy, if I were you.’