'I am his mother. You are the woman who is to be his wife. We are more interested in him than all the rest of the world put together. You say he has got rid of those doubts?' 'Yes; I am sure he has.' 'No time is fixed for the marriage?' 'No.' 'Promise me, his mother, one thing. Promise me, should those doubts return, you will never fix a day for your wedding until they have gone away. Promise me you will never marry him while any doubt remains in his mind. I am his mother who asks you to do this.' 'I promise.' CHAPTER X. A DINNER AT HOME. When Mrs Osborne and Marie came down to dinner they seemed to be excellent friends. Mrs Osborne did and said everything she could think of to put Marie at ease and make her feel at home. The mother had one of those sedate, orderly intellects which cannot be comfortable in the presence of any breach in the ordinary rules of conventional life. She would not have been at all content if she had an assurance George would never marry. George's father and grandfather had married, and why should not George? It was true there had been bachelors on both sides of the family; but she did not approve of bachelors. At first she had not liked the thought of George marrying a person whom he had met casually at an hotel in London. She could not endure hotels herself, and put up at them as seldom as possible. But her Uncle Frederick had married an Austrian lady whom he first met at an hotel in the Alps somewhere, and the marriage had turned out excellently. Besides, much as she had disliked the notion of her son marrying an alien, the girl had not been two minutes in the room before she had conceived a liking for her. Of course she was beautiful, and that was a great deal. Then her hands and ears were good, and she walked well enough to wear a coronet. No girl in or about Stratford was so beautiful as Marie. It was not in women the great difference existed, but in men. The vast majority of girls made good wives; and if there is unhappiness in many households, the fault in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred is on the man's side. But there could be no doubt of this simple, straightforward girl making a good wife. Though she had not yet known her a day, she felt as much reliance on her as on one of her own daughters. And then here was this lover of Kate's. What could she think of him?