ho
tangoed with Diana had offered himself for the dance of life, she would
have thrown over Sidney Vandyke at the eleventh hour. But no one
exciting showed signs of entangling himself permanently, and so, when
Major Vandyke wired that the situation in Mexico permitted him to ask
for leave, Di's engagement was announced in the _Morning Post_.

Soon after this, Sidney arrived with cartloads of luggage, which seemed
to detach him from America forever. He had got long leave and intended
to resign from the army at the end of it. He took up his quarters at the
Savoy Hotel, but he was at our house morning, noon, and night; and
though everybody who saw him for the first time said how handsome he
was, it struck me from the minute we met that he had changed for the
worse. He looked older and stouter, and black and white would no longer
express him in a picture. A suffusion of red for the face, as well as
for the lips under the black moustache, would have been needed. I
wondered if he were drinking; and though, when he lunched or dined with
us he was always careful (except with champagne, which he loved as a
child loves sweets), he might be less cautious when out of Diana's
sight.

At first I could hardly bear to sit down at the same table with Sidney
Vandyke; but as time went on, I found an impish pleasure in watching
him, in staring openly, as a baby stares. I had the satisfaction of
feeling that he was disturbed by my gaze, and that he knew, even when
not looking, that my eyes were on him. Sometimes in the midst of talk he
would break down and forget what he had meant to say next. I affected
him with a kind of aphasia, erasing the words he wanted from his brain.
But otherwise my tactics were changed. I was no longer rude to my future
brother-in-law. I wished to study him, and I didn't object to his
knowing that I studied him.

A silent battle was being fought between us under a smooth surface of
civility, and Sidney might easily have complained to Diana that my owl
stare was "getting on his nerves," even though he could have brought no
other complaint. If he had spoken to her she would have made some excuse
to scratch me off her list of bridesmaids. I hoped she would, and save
me trouble! But perhaps Sidney felt that I was yearning for him to
"squeal," and resolved not to please me. In any case, nobody not in the
secret of our hearts could have guessed that anything was wrong. And I
had to play at spraining my ankle in order