object of his quest--the bridal bells had rung, and Diana Antonia Merion
lost her maiden name. She became the Mrs. Warwick of our footballing
world.

Why she married, she never told. Possibly, in amazement at herself
subsequently, she forgot the specific reason. That which weighs heavily
in youth, and commits us to desperate action, will be a trifle under
older eyes, to blunter senses, a more enlightened understanding. Her
friend Emma probed for the reason vainly. It was partly revealed to
Redworth, by guess-work and a putting together of pieces, yet quite
luminously, as it were by touch of tentacle-feelers--one evening that he
passed with Sir Lukin Dunstane, when the lachrymose ex-dragoon and son of
Idlesse, had rather more than dined.




CHAPTER VI

THE COUPLE

Six months a married woman, Diana came to Copsley to introduce her
husband. They had run over Italy: 'the Italian Peninsula,' she quoted
him in a letter to Lady Dunstane: and were furnishing their London house.
Her first letters from Italy appeared to have a little bloom of
sentiment. Augustus was mentioned as liking this and that in the land
of beauty. He patronized Art, and it was a pleasure to hear him speak
upon pictures and sculptures; he knew a great deal about them. 'He is
an authority.' Her humour soon began to play round the fortunate man,
who did not seem, to the reader's mind, to bear so well a sentimental