"How could you think I should be dull here?" she asked, prettily folding her hands, whilst she paused to look at the building and the brilliant _coup d'oeil_ of the garden. "All day long I should be busy with my flowers, and in the evening you should read to me, and teach me all you know, that I may become as wise as you." "I will show you over the house presently, Geraldine. Meanwhile let us seat ourselves under those trees. Dearest," I said, taking her hand, "I have been so long looking forward to this time, when I may call you and think of you as my own, that now it is come I cannot believe it here." "You have not had to wait very long. Did you expect to win me so easily?" "I don't know; but I felt you would become my wife." "But I was not destined for you, or I should have married you first. Is it here we are to sit?" "We are in the shade here." She passed her hand through my arm and pressed her shoulder against mine. "Do you feel happy, Arthur?" "Perfectly happy." "Do you wish to ask me any questions about my past, dearest?" "No. If there is anything I should know you will tell me." She sighed and pressed her cheek against my shoulder. "Arthur," she whispered, "my marriage was not a happy one." "I should have thought that, Geraldine, by your eyes." "Are they so very mournful?" "Sometimes. But mournful does not so well define their expression as pensive. Your heart is sometimes troubled." "With the past," she rejoined quickly and eagerly. "My husband did not love me. He left me. When I became a widow I resolved to bury my sorrow and my life in some quiet obscure corner like Cliffegate. I have a little income, Arthur--why do you not ask me about it? Other men would." "I hope you will not find me altogether like other men; though I hope I am no Pharisee." "I have two hundred a year. It was left me by grandmamma. Her solicitor sends me fifty pounds every quarter. You may have it all, Arthur." "Thanks, dear; and in return you shall have two thousand a year to spend with me." "Is that your fortune?" she asked, opening her eyes. I nodded, with a smile. "How rich you are! But it is nice to have plenty of money, and I shan't love you the less for having it. No; many women would pretend that they would much rather have found you poor, that they might feel sure you knew you were loved only for yourself. Now I am glad you are rich; not because I care for your money, but because I know that such a fortune as yours must have enabled you to see life, and that your choice of me comes after an experience of the world. It will be a matured choice, so that I shall not be likely to lose you." "Geraldine, you talk the language of wisdom, as the Turks say. I _have_ seen life, and can promise you that my love is not the caprice of a greenhorn." "Now you shall show me over your house," she said, jumping up. I conducted her in by the balcony, and when we were in the library I said, "This is the room in which I first saw you." "Here?"