SO SOON!

T THEY rode home sedately in the cool and quiet evening. Mr. Kingston, having accomplished the end for which he had contrived this unchaperoned expedition, was content to keep close to his pretty sweetheart's side, to look in her face occasionally with significant smiles, and to ruminate on his own good fortune.

Rachel, fluttered and dismayed at the situation in which she found herself, bestowed a wandering attention on the near-side fields and hedges, and discouraged conversation. It is needless to remark that the carriage did not come to meet them. The long shadows lengthened, the sun sank down below the glowing horizon, the glory of the evening faded away into the soft dusk of the autumn night.

Lamps were being lighted when they entered Toorak; the workmen who had begun at the foundations of the new house were "knocking off;" the gates of Mrs. Hardy's domain were standing open, and the woman at the lodge informed them that she had not returned from her drive.

They rode up to the house, and Mr. Kingston got off his horse and lifted Rachel down. She disengaged herself from his arms as quickly as possible, and then stood on the doorstep, while the groom led both horses away, and looked at her fiancÉ anxiously, blushing with all her might.

"Won't you let me come in?" he asked smiling. But he did not mean to be refused admittance; and he turned the handle of the door and led her into the hall and into the drawing-room, as if it had been his own house.

The lamps had not been lit in the drawing-room, but a bright fire was burning, making a glow of rich and pleasant colour all over its mossy carpet and its shining furniture. Rachel's flowers were blooming everywhere. Soft armchairs stood seductively round the cheerful hearth. An afternoon tea-table was set for four, with everything on it but the teapot.

"My aunt is late," said Rachel uneasily. "I wonder what can have kept her. I hope there has been no accident."

Mr. Kingston showed all his teeth in a momentary smile, and then addressed himself to the opportunity that had so happily offered.

"Oh, no, she is not late; it is the days that are getting so short," he said. And as he spoke he unfastened her hat and laid it aside, and then drew her burning face to his shoulder and kissed her. She stood still, trembling, to let him do it, one tingling blush from head to foot. She liked him very much; she was very proud and glad that she was going to marry him; she quite understood that it was his right and privilege to kiss her, if he felt so disposed. Still her strongest conscious sentiment was an ardent longing for her aunt's return—or her uncle's, or anybody's. The spiritual woman in her protested against being kissed.

"I want you not to be afraid of me," said Mr. Kingston, half anxious, half amused, as he patted her head. "I am not an ogre, nor Bluebeard either; you seem to shrink from me almost as if I was. You must not shrink from me now, you know."

"I will not—by and bye—when I get used to it," she gasped, with a touch of hysterical excitement, extricating her pretty head, and standing appealingly before him, with her pink palms outwards. "I'm not afraid of you, Mr. Kingston, but—but it is very new yet! I shall get used to it after a little."

He looked down at her with sudden gravity. She was on the verge of tears.

"Oh, yes," he said quietly, almost paternally, "we shall soon get used to each other. There is plenty of time. Let me see—how old are you? Don't tell me; let me guess. Eighteen?"

She smiled and composed herself. Yes, she was just eighteen. Somebody must have told him. No, upon his honour, nobody had; it was his own guess entirely. Did he not think he ought to have chosen someone older for such a position of importance and responsibility? No; she was gallantly assured that she had been an object, not of choice, but of necessity. And so on.

When the dialogue had brought itself down to a sufficiently sober level, he took her hand, and drawing her into a seat beside him, continued to hold it, and to stroke her slight white fingers between his palms.

"They say good blood always shows itself in the fineness of a woman's hands," he said; "if so, you ought to be particularly well-born."

"I don't know what your standard is," she answered, smiling. "My father came of a border family ages ago, I believe. I never knew anything about my mother's parentage; she died when I was a baby."

"I am sure you are well born," he said, looking fondly and proudly at her as she sat in the firelight, with her golden hair shining. "I shall have not only the finest house, but the most beautiful wife to sit at the head of my table. I don't believe there is another woman in Melbourne who will compare with you, especially when you get those diamonds on."

"Diamonds!" ejaculated Rachel.

"Yes; those diamonds you talked about the other night, don't you know?—that you would have if you were very rich. Well, you are going to be very rich. And I am going to order you some of them to-morrow. You must give me the size of your finger. A 'ring full of diamonds,' didn't you say? How full?"

Rachel smiled, blushed, and ceased to feel that strong repugnance to the amenities of courtship which had distressed both herself and her lover at an earlier stage.

Here a servant came in to light the gas. The man appeared conscious of the inopportuneness of his intrusion, and despatched his business in nervous haste, clinking the pendants of the cut-glass chandelier in a manner that his mistress would have highly disapproved of.

Rachel and her visitor watched him with a sort of silent fascination, as if they had never seen gas lighted before. When he was gone, Mr. Kingston took out his watch. It was past six o'clock. He had a dinner engagement at seven, and had to get into town and change his clothes.

"I'm afraid I dare not wait for Mrs. Hardy," he said, rising. "I hate to go, but you know I would not if I could help it. I will see your uncle at his office the first thing in the morning, and come to lunch afterwards. Shall I?"

"If you like," murmured Rachel, shyly. And then she submitted to be kissed again, and being asked to do it, touched her lover's fierce moustaches with her own soft lips—not "minding" it nearly so much as she did at first. She was beginning to get used to being engaged to him.

When immediately after his departure Mrs. Hardy, having left her daughter at her own house, came home, and heard what had been taking place, she could hardly believe the evidence of her ears.

"So soon!" she ejaculated, lifting her hands. "Is it credible? My dear, are you sure you are not making a mistake?"

Remembering the wear and tear of mind and body that the management of these affairs had cost her hitherto—remembering the illusive and unsubstantial nature of all Mr. Kingston's previous attentions to the most attractive marriageable girls—she found the suddenness of the thing confounding.

"Don't you think you may have misunderstood him?" she reiterated, anxiously. "I'm afraid he is rather given to say more—or to appear to say more—than he means sometimes."

Rachel blushingly testified to the good faith of her fiancÉ, by references to the ring for which her finger had already been measured, and to the impending interview at her uncle's office.

"I should never have thought of it of myself Aunt Elizabeth," she said meekly.

Mrs. Hardy sank into an easy chair, and unbuttoned her furs, as if to give her bosom room to swell with the pride and satisfaction that possessed her. Then, looking up at the slender figure on the hearthrug, at the candid innocent face of the child who had been bequeathed to her love and care, a maternal instinct asserted itself.

"My dear," she said, "you are very young, and this is a serious step. You must take care not to run into it heedlessly. Do you really feel that you would be happy with Mr. Kingston? He is much older than you are, you know."

Rachel thought of the new house, and of the diamonds, and of all her lover's tributes to her worth and beauty.

"Yes, I think so, aunt. He is a very nice man. He is very kind to me."

"He has lived so long as a bachelor, that he has got into bachelor ways," Mrs. Hardy reluctantly proceeded. "He has been rather—a—gay, so they say. I doubt if you will find him domesticated, my dear."

"I shall not wish him to stay always at home with me," replied the girl, with a fine glow of generosity. "And I do not mind tobacco-smoke, nor latchkeys, nor things of that sort. And if he is fond of his club, I hope he will go there as often as he likes. I shall not try to deprive him of his pleasures, when he will give me so many of my own. And, you know, dear aunt, I shall be quite close to you; I can never be lonely while I am able to run in and out here."

Mrs. Hardy was reassured. This was the pliant, sweet-natured little creature who would adapt herself kindly to any husband—who was not, of course, an absolutely outrageous brute.

And Mr. Kingston, except that he was a little old, a little of a viveur, a trifle selfish, and, it was said, rather bad tempered when he was put out, was everything that a reasonable girl could desire. She smiled, rose from her chair, and kissed her niece's pretty face with motherly pride and fondness.

"Well, my love, it is a great match for you," she said, "and I hope it will be a happy one as well."

And then, hearing her husband coming downstairs, she left the room hurriedly to meet and drive him back again, that she might explain to him the interesting state of affairs while she put on her gown for dinner.