fay and i were married early in the year, which always appears to me the proper time for marrying and giving in marriage. it seems so appropriate for the new heaven and the new earth to begin at the same time. we went first to the italian lakes and then back to switzerland, so that spring met us in italy, accompanied us through the swiss mountains, and arrived at restham manor about the same time as we did. thus our path was literally strewn with flowers all the way.

it would be both undignified and impossible, to describe what a heavenly time that honeymoon was to me. i had never imagined that such bliss was attainable in this work-a-day world: i thought it only existed in fairy-tales. and indeed my life was a fairy-tale just then, with fay for the leading fairy.

i think that it was a very happy time for her, too; though i could not expect her to feel the absorbing delight in my society that i felt in hers. how could she, considering how dull and stupid i was, and how vivid and radiant was she? but she seemed contented with me, and delighted with the lakes and the mountains and the wealth of flowers: and she grew lovelier and more lovable every day. her intoxicating society renewed my youth, and we walked and rode and boated together like a pair of happy and careless children, till i believed that she had spoken truth when she said that love had indeed accomplished the impossible as far as i was concerned, and had set the shadow on the dial ten degrees backward.

the arrangements for our honeymoon had been highly approved of by annabel, as they prevented that meeting between the east wind and me, which she spent her life in trying to avert, so that by the time we reached home at the end of april, the east wind was chained up again in his kennel with the keenest of his teeth extracted. at least so annabel preached, and so she believed; for my part i had met him rushing loose about the fields on a may morning, with a tooth as keen as any ingratitude of man's.

we arrived at home on a lovely afternoon—one of those blue and golden afternoons of late spring—and found annabel waiting in the hall to welcome us. how good it was to see her there! i should hardly have felt it was a real home-coming without annabel, and nice as it was for me, i felt it was still nicer for fay to have a woman to come home to—a woman who could comprehend and comfort and cherish her as no man, however devoted, could possibly do, and who could, to a certain extent, take the place of the mother whom—to her lifelong impoverishment—she had lost.

"come and have some tea, my dear," said annabel, after we had duly embraced her and greeted the entire household, who were likewise waiting in the hall to receive us.

the household melted away as if we had read the riot act over it, and we three drew near to the gate-legged tea-table.

"you had better pour out, fay," said annabel, "and take your place in your own house from the beginning."

fay was looking so tired that i answered for her. "no, annabel, you do it. fay is really too tired to pour out for us two able-bodied beings. she ought not to wait upon other people, but to let other people wait upon her." she certainly did seem a fragile, fairy-like little thing beside annabel and me.

"shall i, fay?" asked annabel.

"just as reggie likes," replied my darling, with her lovely smile.

"sweetheart, you are too tired to lift that heavy teapot. let annabel do it for you." the vessel in question was part of an extremely solid tea-service which had been presented to my father by an admiring constituency on the auspicious occasion of his marriage, and which resembled a flotilla of silver dreadnoughts.

fay laughed. "i think, as reggie says, i had better not tackle the big teapot till it gets used to me: it might begin to buck or jib, and i'm sure i shouldn't have strength to hold it in if it did."

"it couldn't very well do that," said annabel, taking her accustomed seat at the table, while fay sat on the other side of me; "but it might overflow and trickle down the spout, as it is by no means a good pourer, and jeavons always fills it too full." (jeavons was our butler.) "i can't think why servants always make as much tea for three people as for half-a-dozen."

"i hate teapots that dribble down their chins," remarked fay: "they are so messy."

annabel gently corrected her. "i said spout, my dear, not chin. teapots don't have chins. and now, you two, tell me all your adventures since i saw you last." whereupon she characteristically proceeded to tell us all hers, and we neither of us could get a word in edgeways.

"and the garden is looking perfectly lovely," she concluded, after an exhaustive recital of the recent happenings of restham. "i have had my own way with the forget-me-nots this year, and they are going to be a great success. even cutler now owns that he was wrong and i was right." whereby i perceived that cutler knew on which side of his bread the butter lay.

"of course they are not in their full perfection yet," continued annabel; "but they will be a sight when they are. you see, i was away when they were planted last year, and he didn't put them in nearly closely enough; but this year i superintended them myself."

"then it is sure to be all right," i said.

"it is," replied annabel, unconscious of irony. "if only people would always do what they are told, what a great deal of trouble would be saved! the moment i saw them last year i told cutler they weren't nearly thick enough, but he wouldn't believe me, and said they would spread."

"and didn't they?" i asked, loyalty to my own sex drawing me over to cutler's side.

"not as much as he said they would, so last spring was practically wasted as far as the forget-me-nots were concerned. but it taught him once for all that i knew better than he."

"a spring is never wasted in which one learns wisdom," i remarked.

"i do love forget-me-nots," exclaimed fay. "forget-me-not beds are like adorable blue pools, and i never see one without longing to jump into it and bathe."

"that you must never do, my dear," replied annabel; "if you did, you would entirely spoil the appearance of the beds for that season. they would never close up again properly, but would always look straggling and untidy."

i caught fay's eyes; but to our lasting credit we were both able to postpone our laughter. it is one of the most delightful things in the world to be with somebody who laughs at the same things as one laughs at oneself: it creates a bond that nothing can ever break: a bond devoid of all sentimentality, but none the less powerful on that account. in looking back on as much of life's road as we have already travelled, and recalling thoughts of our fellow-travellers therein, i am not sure that the memories of the friends who shared our jokes are not tenderer than the memories of the friends who shared our sorrows, and they are certainly much pleasanter. i do not, however, pretend that a similarity of taste in jokes is a sufficient basis for matrimony, though a very firm foundation for friendship; but since friendship forms a not inconsiderable part of an ideal marriage, this sympathy in matters humorous is an important consideration in matrimony also. and i am thankful to say that this sympathy existed in full measure between myself and fay.

it existed also between myself and frank, had i given it full run; but there were certain things—such as annabel, for instance—over which i could not allow myself to laugh too much with frank. but there was nothing—not even annabel—over which it would be disloyal to laugh with fay, since husband and wife are one, and many and many a time did she and i have together a merry time over the quaint humours which help considerably to make this present world as delightful a dwelling-place as it is.

but though fay and i often laughed together at my sister's ways—which were certainly very laughter-provoking just then—our laughter was the laughter of love, and i never lost the opportunity of pointing out to fay the sterling goodness which underlay annabel's peculiarities. but i advisedly admitted the peculiarities, as there is nothing which so successfully sets one person against another as an assumption of the latter's flawlessness. the people whose geese are all swans are responsible for many an epidemic of cygnophobia.

but of course i never laughed with annabel over fay's little ways; they, and everything else connected with my darling, were then and always sacrosanct to me. it annoyed me even when frank laughed at her—as he very frequently did—which i admit was inconsistent on my part, since if i had the right to laugh at my sister, he had certainly the right to laugh at his. but though frank's jokes at fay's expense might be lawful, to me they were highly inexpedient.

it was the first sunday after our return home. in the morning fay, annabel and i attended divine service in restham church, and "sat under" arthur, annabel in her usual place at the top of the manor pew, and fay close to me at the bottom, so that during the lessons and the sermon, and such unoccupied times, we could slip our respective hands into one another's without any one perceiving it. as i knelt in the church where i had worshipped from my childhood, and realised that to me had been given my heart's desire, i felt as one who came home with joy, bringing his sheaves with him, and i gave god thanks.

after the service was over we walked round the manor house garden accompanied by arthur, which was as much a part of the morning's ritual as the litany or the prayer for the king. i believe annabel would have thought it almost wicked to omit this sabbatic peregrination, if the weather permitted it. certainly i could not remember a time when we had not walked round the garden every sunday after service, remarking how the vegetable kingdom had either advanced or receded (according to the season of the year) since the preceding sunday.

but if my sister would have included an omission of that sunday morning's walk round the garden among those things left undone which she ought to have done, she certainly would have considered the taking of any further exercise on a sunday as among the things which she ought not to have done; therefore fay and i started off for a long walk that sunday afternoon, unhampered by the encompassing presence of annabel. a nap between lunch and tea was one of the most sacred rites of annabel's strict sabbatic ritual.

"now isn't it lovely to set out for a walk together and to feel that we've got the rest of our lives to finish it in, and that there's nothing to hurry home for?" exclaimed fay, as we walked across the garden.

"there's nothing to hurry home for because we are home," i replied, as we went through the little gate which separated the lawn from the park: "wherever you are is home to me."

"same here," retorted fay; "like snails, we carry our home on our backs, which is very delightful and picnicky when you come to think of it."

"that's where we are so superior to snails," i pointed out; "they carry their own, while we carry each other's: a far finer type, if you'll permit me to say so."

"i remember once when i was a little girl, mother corrected me for being vain, and said it was horrid of me to think i was pretty. i thought it over, and then i came back to her and explained that i didn't think i was pretty—i only thought i was better looking than a frog, and i asked her if it was 'vainness' to think i was better looking than a frog, and she agreed it wasn't. in the same way i don't think it is a 'vainness' of us to think we are finer characters than snails, do you?"

"by no means. and i go farther: i don't even think it is 'vainness' on your part to think you are pretty."

fay laughed. "i'm glad it isn't, for i do."

"you darling!"

"and i'm not selfish in my 'vainness' either," she went on, "or narrow. i think you are very good looking too; much better looking than a frog, reggie, much!"

"you silly child, what nonsense you are talking! you'll really make me horribly vain if you go on like this!" i said reprovingly. but i liked it, nevertheless.

"and a jolly good thing if i did! you aren't vain enough; it's the one flaw in your otherwise admirable character."

"it's much too soon for you to begin to find out your husband's faults, fay; you oughtn't to have discovered one for at least six months. you'll make a terrible wife if you go on like this!"

"i'm not finding out my husband's faults: i'm only regretting that he doesn't possess one."

"he is all fault that hath no fault at all," i quoted.

"oh, i didn't mean that you don't possess a fault at all, far from it; i mean you don't possess one particular fault, namely, vanity, and that it would be a jolly sight better for you if you did. you don't think half well enough of yourself, reggie, you don't really, and it is such a pity. you've no idea how perfectly good and clever and altogether splendid you are."

"then you ought to commend me for my humility instead of scolding me like this," i urged in self-defence.

fay shook her curly head. "humility is a thing which can very soon be overdone—especially in a case like yours."

"for instance?"

"well, you aren't properly proud of the things you ought to be proud of, and you've got such lots of them," explained fay, with some lack of lucidity.

"anyhow i'm jolly proud of the one thing i've a right to be proud of, and that is my wife," i replied.

"that's you all over, wrapping other people up in the mantle of your own virtues, and then admiring the other people for being so awfully well dressed. it's really you that makes us such a tremendously attractive couple. people like me because i'm your wife, and yet you'll always believe they like you because you're my husband. it really is stupid to put the cart before the horse in that way, reggie."

i put my arm through fay's, drawing her nearer to me. "then what on earth do you want me to do, carry a pocket-mirror about with me, and keep taking it out and admiring myself, like narcissus, or else thrust the sanguinary hand of my recent baronetcy into every stranger's face?"

"oh, reggie, what an idiot you are! of course, i think it is perfectly sweet of you not to have a swelled head because you are rich and landed and a baronet and all that, and not to have a swelled head because it is such an extremely good-looking one, with such regular features; i thoroughly approve of that sort of humility, as i'm the last person in the world to encourage swank; but what i do mean is that you have so little confidence in yourself and your own powers that you stand on one side and let other people do the things that you'd do a million times better than they can. you are like that old emperor who thought he couldn't govern europe, and so began to wind up the clock instead."

i smiled. "you've got hold of the wrong end of the stick this time, milady; it was because charles the fifth was sick of the weight of empire that he retired to a monastery and made clocks: and it was considered a most swaggery thing at the time, and was tremendously applauded by an admiring europe, because he was just as good at clockmaking as he was at ruling the world."

"what you might call a good all-round man."

"precisely. now i am the contrary of that. the experience of life has taught me that i am equally inefficient in government and in clockmaking—in short, that i am a thoroughgoing failure, and that therefore my truest wisdom lies in getting other and superior people to rule my empire and make my clocks."

i regret to record that at this point of the conversation lady kingsnorth stood stock still in the middle of the road, and protruded from between her scarlet lips the point of a little pink tongue, and then remarked in terse if inelegant language: "you silly ass!"

i laughed. "your ladyship ought to be ashamed of yourself," i said.

"on the contrary, my ladyship is ashamed of you! i wouldn't be as great a goose as you are, reggie, for ten thousand a year."

"it is about what i get for it," i murmured.

there was a pause whilst i opened a gate for our passing, and shut it again, and then i said: "by the way, my own, it is your birthday this week. what shall i get you for a present?"

fay tripped beside me on the grass. she was very like a child in her movements. "i've had such lovely wedding presents from you that i really don't seem to have room for any more."

"well, you must make room somehow. it would be against all my principles to let so great an occasion as your birthday pass unwept, unhonoured and unsung."

"i really couldn't make room for any more jewellery. i'm plastered over with it already, like a rough-cast house." i had had all my mother's diamonds reset for fay, and had given her a string of pearls on my own account.

"well then, a set of furs ready for the winter," i suggested. "it is a good time now for buying furs."

fay shook her head. "too expensive after all those lovely wedding presents."

"what nonsense, my darling! nothing is too expensive for you."

"i'll tell you what i really do want," said fay, taking my arm and dancing beside me like a little girl: "i want a nice, small prayer book to use every sunday in church. and i should like it bound in green, my favourite colour."

"whatever do you want another prayer book for, sweetheart?" i asked, surprised at this strange request. "our pew is simply paved and panelled with them."

"but i don't like huge things with crests and coats-of-arms on the outside: i can't pray properly out of them. it's like sending one's prayers to heaven in a lord mayor's coach instead of on angels' wings. i want a little green prayer book of my very own, with a 'hymns ancient and modern' at the end of it: one of those semi-detached sort of affairs, don't you know!—in the same case, but with separate entrances. and i want you to give it me and write my name in it, so that my love for you and my prayers and praises will all be bound up together."

"but it seems such a poor present for me to give you, darling," i objected.

"but it's what i want. those crested and coat-of-armed prayer books in the pew are several sizes too large and too grand for me. and they are so public and general, too: nothing private and personal about them. i don't care for a prayer book with the family coat-of-arms on it. and, besides, i don't think coats-of-arms and prayer books are in the same dimension, somehow."

"how do you mean, sweetheart?" fay's ideas—ideas which annabel would have dismissed as "funny"—were always of absorbing interest to me.

"crests and coats-of-arms belong to the temporal things, such as carriages and motors and notepaper and silver-plate, and so are suitable ornaments for all these objects; but names and prayer books belong to the eternal things, and so are on a different plane altogether. when a baby is baptised a christian it isn't given a new crest, but a new name: it isn't crested, so to speak, it is christened. and i always love that text in the bible about him that overcometh being given a white stone with a new name written on it; but you couldn't imagine god giving anybody a white stone with a new crest engraved on it! it would sound absurd. and that is because your name is part of yourself and means you; while a crest is only the sign of your family and signifies your social position and your rank, and all those material, worthless sort of things which the world thinks so much of, but which god really couldn't be bothered with."

fay stopped for breath, she was chattering so fast, and skipping at the same time. she was so full of life and spirits that she never could walk soberly along like other people. and then she began talking again, and so did i, and we continued the enchanting solitude à deux, which is the especial prerogative of marriage, until it was time to return home to tea and annabel.

the next morning, when fay was out of the room, annabel said to me: "reggie, i want to ask your advice?"

"such as it is it is always at your service," i replied; "though i admit i cannot just now recall any occasion when you have availed yourself of it, your own, as a rule, proving adequate for your needs."

"i want to know what to give fay for a birthday present," continued my sister. "just after a wedding and all the presents, it is so difficult to find anything that anybody wants, and it seems a waste of money to buy what is useless."

a brilliant idea occurred to me, one which i thought would prove of assistance in my lifework of bringing fay and annabel nearer together. annabel should give fay the prayer book, and so become identified with what fay called her prayers and praises, and therefore draw nearer to my darling's inmost heart. it was the dream of my life that annabel should be as dear to fay as she was to me, and what better way of securing this than by associating her with fay's moments of religious emotion? it appeared to me a capital plan.

"i know what you can give her," i replied, "a combined prayer book and hymn book beautifully bound: it happens to be just what she wants."

annabel looked scornful. "what a ridiculous suggestion! how can she want a prayer book when our pew is positively packed with them? they fit so tight in the book-ledge that there isn't room for even a pair of gloves or a pocket-handkerchief between."

"she finds them too big: she wants a smaller one of her own." i knew my annabel, and therefore did not enter into any vain attempt to explain to her fay's actual feelings on the subject.

"i can understand her wanting a small one if she had to carry it to church and back. but, as she hasn't, i should have thought the larger the better because of the big print. though of course at fay's age the size of the print doesn't matter as it does to you and me." annabel never tried to cover over the discrepancy in age between my wife and me: not from any disagreeableness; it was not in annabel to be intentionally disagreeable; but the discrepancy was a fact, and it was not her custom to blink facts.

"the size of the print makes no difference to me," i replied, somewhat nettled. "i can see small print as well as large."

"that is because you are so short-sighted. short-sighted people always keep their sight till they are quite old. but if you were normal you'd have to begin spectacles at your age. i did—at least, for fine sewing and small print."

"well, i've told you what fay wants, and you can get it or not, as you like," i said, collecting my letters and preparing to leave the room. "if you decide on it; i'll select it for you in town, where i am going to-morrow; and if you decide on something else, i'll get fay the prayer book myself."

after further cogitation and argument, annabel finally agreed to accept my suggestion; so on the following day i went up to london and selected a really exquisite little "semi-detached" prayer book and hymn book, bound in the loveliest grass-green calf and richly tooled with gold, for annabel to give to fay; and for my own present to my darling i bought the finest set of sables i could find, which even "at summer prices" ran well into three figures. and my heart leaped with joy to think how beautiful she would look in them and how pleased she would be, for my child-wife dearly loved a bit of finery.

and—remembering what fay had said—i specially instructed annabel to write my darling's name in the little green prayer book before giving it to her.

on the morning of fay's birthday i was as excited as a child. i could not help knowing that both the furs and the prayer book were things of beauty, and i rejoiced at the thought of my darling's pleasure in them. i think there are few things more delightful than the giving of a really handsome present to a person who is able to appreciate it. i had tried my utmost to procure for fay things which i knew were perfect of their kind, and i flattered myself that i had succeeded.

fay was radiant when she awoke on her birthday morning, and i hurried over my toilet so as to be downstairs first in order to put her presents by her place at the breakfast-table.

"they really are lovely furs, reggie," said annabel, as i laid them out. "i never saw sables of such a beautiful colour. and after all is said and done, there is no fur that looks as handsome as sable."

"i'm glad you like them," i replied; "i really think they are rather nice."

"but i wish you hadn't induced me to buy that absurd prayer book. it seems a most unsuitable present for a bright young creature like fay."

"oh, that'll be all right," said i, smiling in my superior knowledge of my darling's wishes.

then fay came into the room, and her face lit up at the sight of her presents.

"oh, reggie, how lovely!" she exclaimed, rushing to the breakfast-table to examine them more closely. first she picked up the prayer book, and at once turned to the fly-leaf where her dear name was written. then a puzzled expression clouded her face. "frances kingsnorth, from her affectionate sister-in-law annabel," she read aloud. "i don't quite understand," she added, looking to me for explanation. "i thought you were going to give me the prayer book."

"so i was, darling," i replied; "but then it occurred to me what a good thing it would be for annabel to give you that, and for me to give you the set of furs i had originally intended. annabel was so anxious to give you something that you really wanted, and i knew you wanted that."

"it is lovely," said fay, turning over the leaves with her slim fingers, and glancing at the illuminations inside the book. "thank you so much, dear annabel." and she came round to annabel's place and kissed her.

"i am glad you like it, my dear," said annabel. "i wanted to get you something to wear—something more suitable for a young girl than a prayer book, but reggie insisted."

"it was so dear of you to want to get me exactly what you thought i wanted," fay replied; "and i think it is the most exquisite prayer book that i've ever seen" (which i really believe it was).

"and now you must look at my present, sweetheart," i said, spreading out the furs.

"they are beautiful; much too handsome for me."

"nothing is too handsome for you, fay: cloth-of-gold wouldn't be, if i could get it. won't you try them on?"

"not now, i think. thank you very much for them, reggie, but it really is too hot a morning for trying on furs."

"so it is, my dear," annabel chimed in. "i wonder at reggie's being so stupid as to suggest it; and before you've had your breakfast, too," she added, as if breakfast were a cooling ceremony.

and then we all sat down to breakfast. fay was absolutely different from what she had been upstairs; but that was just her way; she was as changeable and charming as an april day, and with as little reason for it.

two or three weeks after this, annabel said to me: "you were wrong after all about that absurd prayer book, reggie. i know it was a ridiculous present for a young girl. i'd much better have given fay a new sunshade, or something pretty to wear."

"it was what she said she wanted," i urged in self-defence.

"you must have misunderstood her. you are rather stupid, you know, at misunderstanding people: it comes from being so dreamy and thinking of other things. and she couldn't really have wanted it, for i notice that she never takes it to church."

i had noticed this also, but had carefully refrained from remarking upon it. i endeavoured never to remark upon fay's doings for fear she should imagine i wanted to control them: my one desire was that she should feel as free as air.

"it doesn't really matter," continued annabel; "but the next time i shall select fay's birthday present myself. i never thought you'd understand a young girl's thoughts and wishes, and i don't see how it is to be expected that you should, at your age and with no experience of them. but in future i shall use my own judgment."

whereupon annabel, intent upon her household duties, left me with the crushing conviction that i was a failure as a husband, as i had been in everything else.

even with fay—who was dearer to me than life itself—i seemed to do the wrong thing.

and yet this time i could not see where i had blundered. she certainly said that she wanted a green prayer book with her name written in it.