“As dull as a great thaw,” she quoted to her companion cheerfully.  “It does seem a pity the snow should have gone away before Christmas.  Do you know, all the years of my life I’ve never seen snow on Christmas.  I do wish Mhor wouldn’t go on praying for it.  It’s so stumbling for him when Christmas comes mild and muggy.  If we could only have it once as you see it in pictures and read about it in books—­”

She broke off to bow to Miss Watson and her sister, Miss Teenie, who passed Jean and her companion with skirts held well out of the mud, and eyes, after the briefest glance, demurely cast down.

“They are going out to tea,” Jean explained to Lord Bidborough.  “Don’t they look nice and tea-partyish?  Fur capes over their best dresses and snow boots over their slippers.  Those little black satin bags hold their work, and I expect they have each a handkerchief edged with Honiton lace and scented with White Rose.  Probably they are going to Mrs. Henderson’s.  She gives wonderful teas, and they will be taken to a bedroom to take off their outer coverings, and they’ll stay till about eight o’clock and then go home to supper.”

Lord Bidborough laughed.  “I begin to see what Pam means when she talks of the lovableness of a little town.  It is cosy, as she says, to see people go out to tea and know exactly where they are going, and what they’ll do when they get there.”

“I should think,” said Jean, “that it would rather appeal to you.  Your doings have always been on such a big scale—­climbing the highest mountains in the world, going to the very farthest places—­that the tiny and the trivial ought to be rather fascinating by contrast.”

Lord Bidborough admitted that it was so, and silence fell between them.

“I wonder,” said Jean politely, having cast round in her mind for a topic that might interest—­“I wonder what you will attempt next?  Jock says you want to climb Everest.  He is frightfully excited about it, and wishes you would wait a few years till he is grown up and ready.”

“Jock is a jewel, and he will certainly go with me when I attempt Everest, if that time ever comes.”

They had reached the entrance to Hopetoun:  the avenue to the house was short.  “Would you mind,” said Lord Bidborough, “walking on with me for a little bit?...”

“But why?” asked Jean, looking along the dark, uninviting road.  “They’ll wonder what’s become of us, and tea will be ready, and Mrs. Hope doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

“Never mind,” said Lord Bidborough, his tone somewhat desperate.  “I’ve got something I want to say to you, and this may be my only chance.  Jean, could you ever—­I mean, d’you think it possible—­oh, Jean, will you marry me?”

Jean backed away from him, her mouth open, her eyes round with astonishment.  She was too much surprised to be anything but utterly natural.

“Are you asking me to marry you?  But how ludicrous!”