"I—I was not ignoring you," he stammered, "I was telling you about—"

"Oh, I know!" cried Diana, uncontrollable pain in her voice, and the look of a wounded leopard in her eyes, "Bother your tall grasses, and your oleanders, and your hippopotamus!" Then more gently, but still holding his hand pressed against her velvet coat: "Oh, don't let's quarrel, David! I don't want to be horrid! But we can't ignore the fact that we were married this morning; and you are wasting the only time left to us, in which to discuss our future."

David gently drew away his hand, folded his arms across his breast, leaned back in his corner, and looked at Diana, with that expression of patient tenderness which always had the effect of making her feel absurdly young, and far removed from him.

"Have we not said all there is to say about it?" he asked, gently.

"No, silly, we have not!" cried Diana, furiously. "Oh, how glad I am that you are going to Central Africa!"

David's face whitened to a terrible pallor.

"There is nothing new in that," he said, speaking very low. "It has been understood all along."

"Oh, David, forgive me," cried Diana. "I did not mean to say anything unkind. But I am so miserable and unhappy; and if you say another word about Hampshire scenery or African travel, I shall either swear and break the windows, or fall upon your shoulder and weep. Either course would involve you in an unpleasant predicament. So, for your own sake, help me, David."

David's earnest eyes searched her face.

"How can I help you?" he asked, his deep voice vibrating with an intensity which assured Diana of having gained at last his full attention. "What has made you miserable?"

"Our wedding-service," replied Diana, with tears in her voice. "It meant so much more than I had ever dreamed it possibly could mean."

Then a look leapt into David's eyes such as Diana had never seen in mortal eyes, before.

"How?" he said; the one word holding so much of question, of amazement, of hope, of suspense, that its utterance seemed to arrest the train; to stop the beating of both their hearts; to stay the universe a breathing space; while he looked, with a world of agonised hope and yearning, into those sweet grey eyes, brimming over with tears.

Perhaps the tears blinded them to the meaning of the look in David's. Anyway, his sudden "How?" bursting as a bomb-shell into the silent railway-carriage, only brought an expression of startled surprise, to add to the trouble in Diana's sweet face.

David pulled himself together.

"How?" he asked again, more gently; while the train, the hearts, and the universe went on once more.