Once inside, he threw hat, gloves, and crop down on the table, blew out the candles, and, crossing the room, lowered himself gingerly on to the window seat. ‘Let’s sit in the dark.—Jeshurun! I am stiff, though!—You don’t mind—the dark I mean—do you? It’s more peaceful.’ I minded nothing but delay, for a feverish impatience was upon me. ‘Yes,’ he went on; ‘the finishing touch has to be yours, Brownlow. There’s something I want you to do for me, as usual.’ ‘What?’ I asked. ‘This: You remember that which happened a year ago to-day?’ His tone changed, sobered. I did remember, and told him so. ‘I have waited through a whole year as a penance—a penance self-inflicted in expiation of certain sins. During that year I have lived cleanly.’ And I felt, rather than saw, his eyes fixed on mine—felt, too, that his face flushed. ‘I knew perfectly well by waiting I risked losing what I supremely long for. But I accepted that risk as part of my penance—the very heart of it, in fact.’ ‘Yes,’ I murmured, greatly marvelling to what his speech should lead up. He leaned across and laid his hand on my knee. ‘I rode over to Westrea to-day,’ he said. ‘Westrea? What do you know—how have you heard about Westrea?’ I exclaimed. ‘From Warcop, when last we were at Hover. I could not say anything to you, Brownlow, because I would not have you involved. The Braithwaites were your friends, and I didn’t want, of course, to come between you and them, which could hardly have been avoided if—well, if things had turned out badly for me.’ Again that note of uncontrollable gladness in his voice. ‘I felt it would be unfair to ask questions of you, as I could not explain; and the penance had to be completed in full before I could talk of it. But Warcop was different. I had no scruple in finding out from him where they—where she—now lived. And⸺’ He turned, leaning his elbow on the window-sill, speaking softly, and looking out into the fair windless night. ‘I—I have seen her. I have been with her nearly all day. Braithwaite was away, luckily—at Thetford, I believe she told me—at some political meeting. She has not changed, except that she is even more beautiful than I remembered. And she loves me. She will marry me, when her father gives his consent.’ A minute or more of silence, for I could not bring myself to speak. But, absorbed as Hartover was in his own joy, he failed to notice it, I think. Presently he faced round, and once more I felt his eyes fixed on mine.