Lilias's thoughts roamed back over the past, and a dull resentment against her _fiance_ grew in her mind; for did it not seem that he had always been unlucky, that the brief space of prosperity that had preceded her engagement had been the exception, not the rule, in his experiences? Old Mr Talbot had died while Ned was still at college, and the necessity of looking after the business for the benefit of the family had compelled the young fellow to sacrifice his own hopes of a profession, and settle down to a commercial life. Mr Talbot had owned "Works" of some kind; Lilias had the haziest idea of their purport. Ned manufactured "engines and things," she told her friends vaguely, and spent his days amidst clanking machinery, in an atmosphere impregnated with steam and oil. A dozen years before, "the Works" had been a profitable concern, but it had steadily declined in value, as more powerful firms monopolised the trade. Ned had struggled hard against the tide, but his term of management had been far from prosperous, and when, a year ago, his most formidable rival had come forward with an offer to take over the smaller firm, and instal him in the position of manager over the united businesses, he had been thankful to accept, and to believe that his anxieties were at an end. Six months--scarcely six months--and already he was beginning to feel uneasy, to suspect trouble ahead! Lilias tightened her lips, and her eyes gave out an impatient flash. It requires a noble nature to preserve unswerving confidence in a man through a period of reverse, and Lilias was not capable of the effort. It seemed to her that such a want of success must surely be Ned's own fault, and something startlingly like dislike sprang up in her heart, as she realised how closely she herself would be involved in his failure. Her mother had declared that it was her duty to encourage Ned in his quixotic scruples; but surely, surely, it was also Ned's duty to consider her interests, and to be ready to sacrifice his scruples, if they threatened injury to the future which she had agreed to share! Lilias was as angry as it was in her nature to be, but her love of approval made her unwilling to exhibit herself in so unamiable a mood, and she rushed upstairs to the porch room to recover her composure before joining her sisters in the garden. The worst of belonging to a large family, however, is that it is exceedingly difficult to secure privacy, and, as fate would have it, who should be seated in the porch room but Nan herself, the very last member of the household whom Lilias would have wished to meet in the circumstances. Her flushed face and tearful eyes could not escape attention, but while Maud would have been tactfully silent, Elsie sympathetic, Agatha gushing, and Christabel apparently unconscious, Nan must needs stare with all her eyes, whistle like a schoolboy, and exclaim inelegantly-- "Halloa! What's up? What in the world are you in a rage about now?"