AND so the knots the Fates had twisted were unravelled, and the threads re-woven into the beautiful pattern of joy and gladness, love and friendship.  
One day Paul took Sara down to Hampshire to see his mother, a white-haired old lady with a wrinkled face and a peaceful mouth, and eyes like Paul’s. She took Sara at once to her heart.
 
“Dearie,” she said, “my boy has had a lonely life, and I thank God he has found a woman like you to fill it.”
 
And Sara in her turn loved the old lady, not only for Paul’s sake, but for her own. And she loved the little cottage where she lived, and she loved the old-fashioned garden with its box-edged paths, and flower-beds in which a few late autumn flowers still lingered. The rooms in the cottage were small, but all as dainty and clean as porcelain, and fragrant with the scent of lavender and potpourri. She showed Sara the bedrooms with their old chintz curtains before the casement windows, and the frilly dressing-tables, and white-valanced beds. They had each the effect of a [Pg 305]Dresden china Shepherdess—the tiniest bit stiff, but extraordinarily dainty. She showed her her store cupboard with its pots of jam, marmalade, and pickles, and she promised her a recipe for curing hams and another for making oat cake.
 
And Sara told her how to make spaghetti, and told her it was the first dish she had ever cooked for Paul. And in the evening when they went away she took with her a great bunch of Michaelmas daisies. And Mrs. Treherne kissed her and blessed her, for she knew that the next day she was to be Paul’s wife.
 
The reception was to be held in Miss Mason’s studio by special request from Paul and Sara. Sara felt that already the house on the Embankment was hers no longer.
 
There were to be few guests at the wedding—only the other artists of the courtyard, Bridget, Christopher, Andrew, and the two executors of Giuseppe’s will, who would bring with them the important letter whose secret would be at last disclosed. The journey and the fatigue of the ceremony, however quiet, would have been too much for Mrs. Treherne. Sara’s own father and mother had been dead several years. Christopher was to give away the bride, and Barnabas was to be best man.
 
And so the day dawned, a still, November day of soft mists and a pale blue sky—a tender day full of peace and happiness.
 
Christopher went to the house on the Embankme............