And now he held both hands, and his confident smile dazzled her. "I--" Her voice broke. She tried again, still in a whisper. "I will be everything to you--that a woman can." At that he put his arm round her, and she let him take that first kiss, in which she gave him her youth, her life--all that she had and was. Then she withdrew herself, and he saw her brow contract, and her mouth. "I know!"--he said, tenderly--"I know! Dear, I think he would have been glad. He and I made friends from the first." She plucked at the heather beside her, trying for composure. "He would have been so glad of a son--so glad--" And then, by contrast with her own happiness, the piteous memory of her father overcame her; and she cried a little, hiding her eyes against Marsham's shoulder. "There!" she said, at last, withdrawing herself, and brushing the tears away. "That's all--that's done with--except in one's heart. Did--did Lady Lucy know?" She looked at him timidly. Her aspect had never been more lovely. Tears did not disfigure her, and as compared with his first remembrance of her, there was now a touching significance, an incomparable softness in all she said and did, which gave him a bewildering sense of treasures to come, of joys for the gathering. Suddenly--involuntarily--there flashed through his mind the recollection of his first love-passage with Alicia--how she had stung him on, teased, and excited him. He crushed it at once, angrily. As to Lady Lucy, he smilingly declared that she had no doubt guessed something was in the wind. "I have been 'gey ill to live with' since we got up to town. And when the stupid meeting I had promised to speak at was put off, my mother thought I had gone off my head--from my behavior. 'What are you going to the Feltons' for?--You never care a bit about them.' So at last I brought her the map and made her look at it--'Felton Park to Brinton, 3 miles--Haylesford, 4 miles--Beechcote, 2 miles and 1/2--Beechcote Manor, half a mile--total, ten miles.'--'Oliver!'--she got so red!--'you are going to propose to Miss Mallory!' 'Well, mother!--and what have you got to say?' So then she smiled--and kissed me--and sent you messages--which I'll give you when there's time. My mother is a rather formidable person--no one who knew her would ever dream of taking her consent to anything for granted; but this time"--his laugh was merry--"I didn't even think of asking it!" "I shall love her--dearly," murmured Diana. "Yes, because you won't be afraid of her. Her standards are hardly made for this wicked world. But you'll hold her--you'll manage her. If you'd said 'No' to me, she would have felt cheated of a daughter." "I'm afraid Mrs. Fotheringham won't like it," said Diana, ruefully, letting herself be gathered again into his arms.