He seated himself in his father’s easy-chair, a roomy old chair with projecting sides, that almost hid him from the other occupants of the room. He was weary and sad, and their chatter irritated his overstrung nerves. He would have gone straight to his own room on arriving, but that would have set them wondering, and he did not want to be wondered about. He wanted to keep his secret, or as much of it as he could. No doubt those three knew that he had been fond of her, very fond; that he would have sacrificed half his lifetime to win her for the other half; but they did not know how fond. They did not know that he would fain have melted down all the sands of time into one grain of gold—one golden day in which to hold her to his heart and know she loved him. CHAPTER II. “And warm and light I felt her clasping hand When twined in mine; she followed where I went.” There is a touch of childishness in all honeymoon couples, a something which suggests the Babes in the Wood, left to play together by the Arch-Deceiver, Fate; wandering hand in hand in the morning sunshine, gathering flowers, pleased with the mossy banks and leafy glades, like those children of the old familiar story, before ever hunger or cold or fear came upon them, before the shadow of night and death stole darkly on their path. Even Godfrey Carmichael, a sensible, highly educated young man, whose pride it was to march in the van of progress and enlightenment, even he had that touch of childishness which is adorable in a lover, and which lasts, oh, so short a time; transient as the bloom on the peach, the down on the butterfly’s wing, the morning dew on a rose. He had loved her all his life, as it seemed to him. They had been companions, friends, lovers, for longer than either could remember, so gradual had been the growth of love. Yet the privilege of belonging to each other was not the less sweet because of this old familiarity. “Are we really married—really husband and wife—Godfrey?” asked Juanita, nestling to his side as they stood together in the wide verandah where they breakfasted on these July mornings among climbing roses and clematis. “Husband and wife—such prosaic words. I heard you speak of me to the Vicar yesterday as ‘my wife.’ It gave me quite a shock.” “Were you sorry to think it was true?” “Sorry—no! But ‘wife.’ The word has such a matter-of-fact sound. It means a person who writes cheques for the house accounts, revises the bill of fare, and takes all the blame when the servants do wrong.” “Shall I call you my idol, then, my goddess—the enchantress whose magic wand wafts gladness and sunshine over my existence?” “No, call me wife. It is a good word, after all, Godfrey—a good serviceable word, a word that will stand wear and tear. It means for ever.”