and insisted that it should take place with all due honours at Coles Kenton, where Mary was treated like a favoured niece, and assisted with counsel on her trousseau. The savings she had made during the long years of her engagement were enough to fit her out sufficiently to feel that she was bringing her own wardrobe, and Lady Kenton actually went to London with her to superintend the outlay.
‘Whom would they like to have asked to the wedding?’ the lady inquired, herself naming the Langs and Burfords. ‘Of course,’ she added, smiling, ‘Freda and Alice will be only too happy to be bridesmaids. Have you any one whom you would wish to ask? Your old scholars perhaps.’
‘I think,’ said Mary, hesitating, ‘that one reason why we think we ought to decline your kindness was—about his relations.’
Lady Kenton had given full license to the propriety of calling him Frank with intimate friends, but Mary always had a shyness about it.
‘Indeed, I should make no question about asking them, if I had not doubted whether, after what passed—’
‘That is all forgotten,’ said Mary gently. ‘I have had quite a nice letter since, and—’
‘Of course they must be asked,’ said Lady Kenton; ‘I should have proposed it before, but for that scene.’
‘That is nothing,’ said Mary; ‘the doubt is whether, considering the style of people, it would not be better for us to manage it otherwise, and not let you be troubled.’
‘Oh, that’s nothing! On such an occasion there’s no fear of their not behaving like the rest of the world. There are girls, I think; they should be bridesmaids.’
This very real kindness overcame all scruples, and indeed a great deal might be forgiven to Miss Marshall in consideration of the glory of telling all Westhaven of the invitation to be present ‘at my brother Lord Northmoor’s wedding, at Sir Edward Kenton’s, Baronet.’ He gave the dresses, not only the bridesmaids’ white and cerise (Freda’s choice), but the chocolate moiré which for a minute Mrs. Morton fancied ‘the little spiteful cat’ had chosen on purpose to suppress her, till assured by all qualified beholders, especially Mrs. Rollstone and a dressmaker friend, that in nothing else would she have looked so entirely quite the lady.
And Lady Kenton’s augury was fulfilled. The whole family were subdued enough by their surroundings to comport themselves quite well enough to pass muster.
CHAPTER XI
POSSESSION
So Francis Morton, Baron Northmoor of Northmoor, and Mary Marshall, daughter of the late Reverend John Marshall, were man and wife at last. Their honeymoon was ideally happy. It fulfilled a dream of their life, when Frank used, in the holidays spent by Mary with his mother, to read aloud the Waverley novels, and they had calculated, almost as an impossible castle in the air, the possibility of visiting the localities. And now they went, as assuredly they had never thought of going, and not much impeded by the greatness that had been thrust on them. The good-natured Kentons had dispensed his Lordship from the encumbrance of a valet, and though my Lady could not well be allowed to go maidless, Lady Kenton had found a sensible, friendly person for her, of whom she soon ceased to be afraid, and thus felt the advantage of being able to attend to her husband instead of her luggage.
Tourists might look and laugh at their simple delight as at that of a pair of unsophisticated cockneys. This did not trouble them, as they trod what was to them classic ground, tried in vain the impossible feat of ‘seeing Melrose aright,’ but revelled in what they did see, stood with bated breath at Dryburgh by the Minstrel’s tomb, and tracked his magic spells from the Tweed even to Staffa, feeling the full delight for the first time of mountain, sea, and loch. Their enjoyment was perhaps even greater than that of boy and girl, for it was the reaction of chastened lives and hearts ‘at leisure from themselves,’ nor were spirit and vigour too much spent for enterprise.
They tasted to the full every innocent charm that came in their way, and, above all, the bliss of being together in the perfect sympathy that had been the growth of so many years. Their maid, Harte, might well confide to her congeners that though my lord and my lady were the oldest couple she had known, they were the most attached, in a quiet way.
They were loth to end this state of felicity before taking their new cares upon them, and were glad that the arrangements of the executors made it desirable that they should not take possession till October, when they left behind them the gorgeous autumn beauty of the western coast and journeyed southwards.
The bells were rung, the gates thrown wide open, and lights flashed in the windows as Lord and Lady Northmoor drove up to their home, but it was in the dark, and there was no demonstrative welcome, the indoor servants were all new, the cook-housekeeper hired by Lady Kenton’s assistance, and the rest of the maids chosen by her, the butler and his subordinate acquired in like manner.
It was a little dreary. The rooms looked large and empty. Miss Morton’s belongings had been just what gave a homelike air to the place, and when these were gone, even the big fires could not greatly cheer the huge spaces. However, these two months had accustomed the new arrivals to their titles, and likewise to being waited upon, and they were less at a loss than they would have been previously, though to Mary especially it was hard to realise that it was her own house, and that she need ask no one’s leave. Also that it was not a duty to sit with a fire. She could not well have done so, considering how many were doing their best to enliven the house, and finally she spent the evening in the library, not a very inviting room in itself, but which the late lord had inhabited, and where the present one had already held business interviews. It was, of course, lined with the standard books of the last generation, and Mary, who had heard of many, but never had access to them, flitted over them while her husband opened the letters he had found awaiting him. To her, what some one has called the ‘tea, tobacco, and snuff’ of an old library where the books are chiefly viewed as appropriate furniture, were all delightful discoveries. Even to ‘Hume’s History of England—nine volumes! I did not know it was so long! Our first class had the Student’s Hume. Is there much difference?’
‘Rather to the Student’s advantage, I believe. Half these letters, at least, are mere solicitations for custom! And advertisements!’
‘How the books stick together! I wonder when they were opened last!’
‘Never, I suspect,’ said he. ‘I do not imagine the Mortons were much disposed to read.’
‘Well, they have left us a delightful store! What’s this? Smollett’s Don Quixote. I always wanted to know about that. Is it not something about giants and windmills? Have you read it?’
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