at Captain Baster
would propose that night; and she dreaded it. Two or three times she
rose and walked up and down the room; and when she saw her deep, dark,
troubled eyes in the two old, almost giltless round mirrors, they did
not please her as they usually did. Those eyes were one of the sources
from which had sprung Captain Baster's attraction to her.

But there were the Twins; she longed to do so many useful, needful
things for them; and marriage with Captain Baster was the way of doing
them. She told herself that he would make an excellent stepfather and
husband; that under his unfortunate manner were a good heart and
sterling qualities. She assured herself that she had the power to draw
them out; once he was her husband, she would change him. But still she
was ill at ease. Perhaps, in her heart of hearts, she was doubtful of
her power to make a silk purse out of rhinoceros hide.

When at last a note came from The Plough to say that he was
unfortunately prevented from coming that evening, but would come next
morning to take her for a walk, she was filled with so extravagant a
relief that it frightened her. She sat down and wrote out a telegram
to her brother, rang for old Sarah, their trusty hard-working maid, and
bade her tell the Terror, who had slipped quietly upstairs to bed at
one minute to nine, to send it off in the morning. She did not wish to
take the chance of not waking and despatching it as early as possible.
She must have advice; and Sir Maurice Falconer was not only a shrewd
man of the world, but he would also advise her with the keenest regard
for her interests. She tried not to hope that he would find marriage
with Captain Baster incompatible with them.

Captain Baster awoke in less than his usual cheerfulness. He thought
for a while of the Terror and boots and mud with a gloomy unamiability.
Then he rose and betook himself to his toilet. In the middle of it he
missed his shaving-brush. He hunted for it furiously; he could have
sworn that he had taken it out of his portmanteau. He did swear, but
not to any definite fact. There was nothing for it: he must expose his
tender chin to the cruel razor of a village barber.

Then he disliked the look of his tweed suit; all traces of mud had not
vanished from it. In one short night it had lost its pristine
freshness. This and the ordeal before his chin made his breakfast
gloomy; and soon after it he entered the barber's shop with the air o