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came to know him better I grew to like him. It was quite evident that
he was neither a rascal nor a fortune-hunter. He was not only
immensely proud of Jane but genuinely devoted to her. His kindness
to her was touching. He was a very unselfish and sweet-tempered
young man.
“Well, what do you think of Jane now?” he said to me once,
with boyish triumph.
“I don’t know which of you is more wonderful,” I said. “You
or she.”
“Oh, I’m nothing.”
“Nonsense. You don’t think I’m such a fool as not to see that
it’s you, and you only, who’ve made Jane what she is.”
“My only merit is that I saw what was there when it wasn’t
obvious to the naked eye,” he answered.
“I can understand your seeing that she had in her the possibility
of that remarkable appearance, but how in the world have you made
her into a humorist?”
“But I always thought the things she said a perfect scream. She
was always a humorist.”
“You’re the only person who ever thought so.”
Mrs. Tower, not without magnanimity, acknowledged that she
had been mistaken in Gilbert. She grew quite attached to him. But
notwithstanding appearances she never faltered in her opinion that the
marriage could not last. I was obliged to laugh at her.
“Why, I’ve never seen such a devoted couple,” I said.
“Gilbert is twenty-seven now. It’s just the time for a pretty girl
to come along. Did you notice the other evening at Jane’s that pretty
little niece of Sir Reginald’s? I thought Jane was looking at them both
with a good deal of attention, and I wondered to myself.”
“I don’t believe Jane fears the rivalry of any girl under the
sun.”
“Wait and see,” said Mrs. Tower.
“You gave it six months.”
“Well, now I give it three years.”

When anyone is very positive in an opinion it is only human
nature to wish him proved wrong. Mrs. Tower was really too
cocksure. But such a satisfaction was not mine, for the end that she
had always and confidently predicted to the ill-assorted match did in