d she could not
guess of course that one of his assertions time had already falsified.
He _had_ decided on the lady.

While the notion that he must marry had slumbered, his thought that
Emily should be his wife had slumbered also; but that morning, driving
towards Wigfield, he had stopped at his own house to give some orders,
and then had gone up into "Parliament" to fetch out some small
possessions that his twin daughters wanted. There, standing for a moment
to look about him, his eyes had fallen on his throne, and instantly the
image of Emily had recurred to him, and her attitude as she held his
little child. To give a step-mother to his children had always been a
painful thought. They might be snubbed, misrepresented to him,
uncherished, unloved. But Emily! there was the tender grace of
motherhood in her every action towards a little child; her yearning
sense of loss found its best appeasement in the pretty exactions and
artless dependence of small young creatures. No; Emily might spoil
step-children if she had them, but she could not be unkind.

His cold opinion became a moderately pleased conviction. This was so
much the right thing, that once contemplated, it became the only thing.
He recalled her image again, as he looked at the empty throne, and he
did not leave the room till he had fully decided to set her on it.

When John went back to dinner, he soon managed to introduce her name,
and found those about him very willing to talk of her. It seemed so
natural in that house. John recalled some of the anecdotes of her joyous
girlhood for Dorothea's benefit; they laughed over them together. They
all talked a good deal that evening of Emily, but this made no
difference to John's intention; it was fully formed already.

So the next morning, having quite recovered his spirits, and almost
forgotten what he had said three days before to his host, he remarked to
himself, just as he finished dressing, "She has been a widow now rather
more than a year. The sooner I do it, the better."

He sat down to cogitate. It was not yet breakfast time. "Well," he said,
"she is a sweet creature. What would I have, I wonder!"

He took a little red morocco case from his pocket-book, and opened it.

"My father was exceedingly fond of her," he next said, "and nothing
would have pleased him better."

His father had inherited a very fine diamond ring from his old cousin,
and had been in the habit of wearing it. John, who never decked