Naturally he could not help falling in love with Daisy, who was the only girl he ever saw except the high-bred, milk-and-water misses whom he sometimes met in Lady Jane's drawing-room, and who, in point of beauty and grace and piquancy, could in no degree compare with the playmate of his childhood.
After the morning when Daisy kept the sun from him in the old yew-shaded garden, and he jestingly proposed to marry her, that she might take care of him, a change came over the girl, who began to develope the talent for intrigue in which she afterward became so successful. And as a preliminary step she made herself so necessary to Archie that his life without her would hardly have been endurable, and of his own accord he always shortened as much as possible, his visits to London, for he knew how bright was the face and how warm the welcome awaiting him at Stoneleigh.
And so it came about that when Daisy was sixteen and he was twenty, he offered himself to the girl, who pretended no surprise or reserve, but promptly answered yes, and then suggested that their engagement be kept a secret from every one until he came of age and could do as he pleased, for Daisy well knew the fierce opposition he would meet from his proud relatives, if once they knew that he had stooped to the daughter of a dressmaker. And so well did she manage the affair that not even Dorothy suspected the real state of affairs, until one morning, when Archie, who had been absent for two weeks on a tour through Scotland, astonished her by walking into the house with Daisy, whom he introduced as his wife and the mistress of Stoneleigh. She, too, had been to Scotland to visit some friends, and there the marriage was consummated, and Archie had some one to take care of him at last.
And when his uncle John wrote him a most angry letter denouncing him as his nephew, and cutting off his yearly allowance, which, though small, was still something to depend upon, Daisy rose to the situation and managed his annuity, and managed the household, and managed him, until enough was saved from their slender means to start on the campaign which she had planned for herself, and which she carried out so successfully.
The Continent was her chosen field of action, and Monte Carlo the point toward which she steadily set her face; until, at last, one Lovely October day, five months after her marriage, Mr. and Mrs. Archibald McPherson, of Stoneleigh, Wales, were registered at the Hotel d'Angleterre, and look possession of one of the cheapest rooms, until they could afford a better.