"silly." The engaged couple met often, since in a town of the size of Chumley every gathering brings together the same people, but _tete-a-tetes_ were less frequent. When Dane spent an evening at the Cottage, Teresa wondered if she were bold and unmaidenly because she longed to carry off her lover to the snuggery on the second floor, and felt exasperated when he sat contentedly in the drawing-room chatting with Mrs Mallison and Mary, and even volunteering to play a game with the Major. On Sunday afternoons, when they were left alone as a matter of course, he would kiss her and stroke her hair, and say pretty things about her complexion, and the pretty blue dress, but invariably, infallibly he would relapse into the old quizzical, irresponsible mood, treating her as if she were an amusing child, rather than a woman and his promised wife. Teresa's attempts to give a serious turn to the conversation were ponderous enough to add to Dane's amusement, and he would laugh still more, and even mimic her to her face. Another subject that troubled Teresa was that her lover made no allusions to the date of their marriage. At least once a day Mrs Mallison would enquire curiously, "And has the Captain said anything about the date?" and it was humiliating to reply continually in the negative. Lovers in books were always urgent in this respect; the lovers she had known in real life had been no less impetuous, and in Dane's case there seemed no reason for delay. He was old enough; he had enough money-- then why should they wait? Teresa could not bring herself to introduce such a topic, but she did tentatively mention the honeymoon one day, asking Dane where he would take her. For a moment he looked startled, but at the hint of a foreign tour he brightened, and they spent a delightful hour, discussing routes, and rival places of interest. Teresa had never yet crossed the Channel, and Dane as a world-traveller felt a prospective pleasure in the thought of introducing her to fresh scenes. To him it seemed pitiful to think of a human creature having spent twenty-four years in Chumley, with no change but an occasional month in seaside lodgings. He displayed frank pity for such a fate, but Teresa exhibited no pity for herself. She was very fond of Chumley; she was fond of the Chumley people; it was nice to travel now and then for a few weeks at a time, but she preferred a settled life. Dane realised with amusement that Rome itself would be judged from a Chumley standpoint. The Squire was highly amused at the story of Grizel's first dinner party, and pointed many morals thereon for his wife's benefit. Almost it seemed that he blamed her because his own dining-room ceiling had never descended, and opened the way for such an unconventional evening. "But you would have sent them away from the door! Given the message to Johnson, and turned them away without even seeing them yourself."