Sherwin made congratulatory speeches, kissed his daughter, shook hands
with me, frowned a private rebuke at his wife for shedding tears, and,
finally, led the way with Margaret out of the vestry. The rain was
still falling, as they got into the carriage. The fog was still
thickening, as I stood alone under the portico of the church, and
tried to realise to myself that I was married.

_Married!_ The son of the proudest man in England, the inheritor of a
name written on the roll of Battle Abbey, wedded to a linen-draper's
daughter! And what a marriage! What a condition weighed on it! What a
probation was now to follow it! Why had I consented so easily to Mr.
Sherwin's proposals? Would he not have given way, if I had only been
resolute enough to insist on my own conditions?

How useless to inquire! I had made the engagement and must abide by
it--abide by it cheerfully until the year was over, and she was mine
for ever. This must be my all-sufficing thought for the future. No
more reflections on consequences, no more forebodings about the effect
of the disclosure of my secret on my family--the leap into a new life
had been taken, and, lead where it might, it was a leap that could
never be retraced!

Mr. Sherwin had insisted, with the immovable obstinacy which
characterises all feeble-minded people in the management of their
important affairs, that the first clause in our agreement (the leaving
my wife at the church-door) should be performed to the letter. As a
due compensation for this, I was to dine at North Villa that day. How
should I employ the interval that was to elapse before the
dinner-hour?