all the
rough places of life, had now not failed, but turned itself inwards,
burning in an intense flame at once of pain and of rebellion against its
own pain.

Tims in the midst of her happiness, felt vaguely scared. Mildred seeing
it, recovered herself and plunged into the usual engagement talk. In a
few minutes she was her old beguiling self--the self to whose charm Tims
was as susceptible in her way as Thomas the Rhymer had been in his.

When she had left, and from time to time thereafter, Tims felt vaguely
uncomfortable, remembering Mildred's outburst of vehement bitterness on
the subject of love. It was so unlike her usual careless tone, which
implied that it was men's business, or weakness, to be in love with
women, and that only second-rate women fell in love themselves.

Mildred seemed altogether more serious than she used to be, and Milly
herself could not have been more sympathetic over the engagement. Even
Mr. Fitzalan, when Tims brought him to call on the Stewarts was not
afraid of her, and found it possible to say a few words in reply to her
remarks. Tims's ceremonious way of speaking of her betrothed, whom she
never mentioned except as Mr. Fitzalan, made Ian reflect with sad humor
on the number of offensively familiar forms of address which he himself
had endured from her, and on the melancholy certainty that she had never
spoken of him in his absence by any name more respectful than the plain
unprefixed "Stewart." But he hoped that the excitement of her engagement
had wiped out of her remembrance that afternoon when poor Milly had
tried to return. For he did not like to think of that moment of weakness
in which he had allowed Tims to divine so much of a state of mind which
he could not unveil even to himself without a certain shame.

CHAPTER XXIX

The summer was reaching its height. The weather was perfect. Night after
night hot London drawing-rooms were crowded to suffocation, awnings
sprang mushroom-like from every West End pavement; the sound of music
and the rolling of carriages made night, if not hideous, at least
discordant to the unconsidered minority who went to bed as usual.
Outside in the country, even in the suburbs, June came in glory, with
woods in freshest livery of green, with fragrance of hawthorn and broom
and gorse, buttercup meadows and gardens brimmed with roses. It seemed
to George Goring and Mildred as though somehow this warmth, this gayety
and richness of life in the