e you, which is more than I have. God bless me, it
only seems like yesterday since the big bunch of holly tied to the
hook in the ceiling there fell down on the breakfast table and smashed
all the cups, and yet it is more than sixty years ago. Dear me! how
angry my poor mother was. She never could bear the crockery to be
broken--it was a little failing of your grandmother's," and he laughed
more heartily than Ida had heard him do for some weeks.

She made no answer but busied herself about the tea. Presently,
glancing up she saw her father's face change. The worn expression came
back upon it and he lost his buoyant bearing. Evidently a new thought
had struck him, and she was in no great doubt as to what it was.

"We had better get on with breakfast," he said. "You know that Cossey
is coming up at ten o'clock."

"Ten o'clock?" she said faintly.

"Yes. I told him ten so that we could go to church afterwards if we
wished to. Of course, Ida, I am still in the dark as to what you have
made up your mind to do, but whatever it is I thought that he had
better once and for all hear your final decision from your own lips.
If, however, you feel yourself at liberty to tell it to me as your
father, I shall be glad to hear it."

She lifted her head and looked him full in the face, and then paused.
He had a cup of tea in his hand, and held it in the air half way to
his mouth, while his whole face showed the over-mastering anxiety with
which he was awaiting her reply.

"Make your mind easy, father," she said, "I am going to marry Mr.
Cossey."

He put the cup down in such a fashion that he spilt half the tea, most
of it over his own clothes, without even noticing it, and then turned
away his face.

"Well," he said, "of course it is not my affair, or at least only
indirectly so, but I must say, my love, I congratulate you on the
decision which you have come to. I quite understand that you have been
in some difficulty about the matter; young women often have been
before you, and will be again. But to be frank, Ida, that Quaritch
business was not at all suitable, either in age, fortune, or in
anything else. Yes, although Cossey is not everything that one might
wish, on the whole I congratulate you."

"Oh, pray don't," broke in Ida, almost with a cry. "Whatever you do,
pray do not congratulate me!"

Her father turned round again and looked at her. But Ida's face had
already recovered its calm, and he could make nothing of it.