However, I boarded the train at St. Pancras in a fairly cheerful mood, and I tried to look on the bright side of life. The afternoon was certainly beautiful, and the train not too crowded, and I derived some pleasure, too, from the contemplation of a new pair of American boots which I had recently purchased. I remembered that Mrs. Vernon used to accuse me of a slight foppishness in the matter of boots, at the same time wishing audibly (in his hearing) that Jack would give a little more attention to the lower portions of his toilet; Jack was a sportsman, and her husband. And I thought of their roomy and comfortable house on the side of the long slope to Bedbury, and of their orchard and the hammocks under the trees in the orchard, and of tea and cakes being brought out to those hammocks, and of the sunsets over the Delectable Mountains (we always called them the Delectable Mountains because they are the identical hills which Bunyan had in mind when he wrote “The Pilgrim’s Progress”), and of Jack’s easy drawl and Mrs. Vernon’s chatter, and the barking of the dogs, and the stamping of the horses in the stable. And I actually thought: This will be a pleasant change after London. “I do hope they won’t be awkward and self-conscious,” I said to myself. “And I also must try not to be.” You see I was thinking of that last visit and what occurred during it. I was engaged to be married then, to a girl named Lucy Wren. Just as I had arrived at the Vernons’ house in their dog-cart the highly rural postman came up in his cart, and after delivering some letters produced still another letter and asked if anyone of the name of Bostock was staying there. I took the letter: the address was in Lucy’s handwriting (I had seen her only on the previous night, and of course she knew of my visit). I read the letter, standing there in the garden near the front door, and having read it I laughed loudly and handed it to Mrs. Vernon, saying: “What do you think of that for a letter?” In the letter Lucy said that she had decided to jilt me (she didn’t use those words--oh no!), and that on the following day she was going to be married to another man. Yes, that was a cheerful visit I paid to the Vernons, that August! At first I didn’t know what I was doing. They soothed me, calmed me. They did their best. It wasn’t their fault after all. They suggested I should run back to town and see Lucy; Jack offered to go with me. (Jack!) I declined. I declined to do anything. I ate hearty meals. I insisted on our usual excursions. I talked a lot. I forced them to pretend that nothing had happened. And on Monday morning I went off with a cold smile. But it was awful. It stood between me and the Vernons for a long time, a terrible memory. And when next Mrs. Vernon encountered me, in London, there were tears in her eyes and she was speechless.