“No, but I assure you your best will not pall.”

Edrnonson’s smile of welcome to the lady broadened.  “The fellow has quickness sometimes,” he thought, “he has caught that from me.”

“They are all following,” said Lady Dacre.  “But our kind host joined us just now, and he and his mother are arranging the hour for the sail, that is, if the wind will favor us.”

“I should not think Archdale would be over fond of sailing,” remarked Edmonson dryly.

“Why not?” asked Lady Dacre, then recollecting the story, added suddenly, “Do you think that is a real marriage, Mr. Edmonson?”

“I am sure I don’t know,” responded that gentleman nonchalently.

“You see,” explained Bulchester, “if that man is really a parson, they have not much of a set of witnesses to prove that the ceremony was a joke.  Harwin minus, though he has left his confession; Waldo interested in proving it a real marriage; Mistress Katie interested the other way, and the Eveleigh,—­you have not seen the Eveleigh?”

Lady Dacre replied that she had not had that pleasure.  As she spoke she intercepted a flashing glance from Edmonson to Bulchester.  But she did not overhear the conversation between the two that took place later.

“Bulchester,” Edmonson hissed out when they were alone, “what’s the reason you always retail my opinions?”

Bulchester opened his mild eyes.

“Did I say any harm?” he asked.  “I am sure I didn’t mean it; what objection can you have to my giving your opinion on that matter, and I did not even say it was yours.”

“Because—­I do object,” returned the other moodily.  Then he said nothing more, rather to conceal the strength of his objections, than because his anger was over.

This happened a few hours later.  At the same time Lady Dacre was speaking to her husband about Elizabeth.  “I think that Archdale must feel the situation most on account of the young betrothed,” Sir Temple said.

“That is all you know of a woman,” she retorted indignantly.  “Suppose I were tied to you and knew you did not care for me, I need not have come three thousand miles to find water enough.”

“To drink?”

“No, you wretch; to drown myself in.”

“You take too much for granted, dont you?” drawled Sir Temple with an amused look.  “And I am afraid you are aping Ophelia.  Now, you are not in her line at all; for one thing, you are too handsome.”

Lady Dacre looked at him keenly, smiled with a moisture in her eyes, and came up to him.

“How much too much do I take for granted?” she asked softly.  Sir Temple burst into a laugh, and kissed her.

“We will borrow poor Archdale’s scales, and weigh it, and find out,” he answered.