For quite a long while now she had lost sight of the goal once set before her eyes by this. Imagination had ceased to be fired by its memory. The three impulsive dashes made in its direction had been so utterly futile that she could only recall the first with mirth, the second with contempt, the last with shame. Val Purcell was now happily restored to his former position of friend and playmate; George Butts?--she had come across Mr. Butts in London and found him in hot pursuit of another lady; and though the thought of poor Tommy Andrews with his weak, imploring mouth and burning eyes could still evoke a twinge, it was but a passing twinge. Tommy had certainly been found out, and Tommy's master was not a person to find out in vain. Dr. Craig had effected what no one else dared attempt, namely, her own escape from thraldom--and she did not see her co-delinquent let off, albeit after another fashion. No, she had nothing more to fear from that quarter; and in the rush and novelty of the past few weeks, bygone follies, big and little, active and passive, dwindled to the vanishing point. If only Sue, dear, good, unconscious Sue, would not recall them! CHAPTER XII. THE PHOTOGRAPH AND THE ORIGINAL. Families in which the daughters marry early and in due succession, can have but little idea of the huge, volcanic shock an engagement means in a house like Boldero Abbey. True, it had once before gone through a like experience, but the present happy occasion was intensified by a variety of causes. It was satisfactory, altogether satisfactory. Like good wine it needed not the bush which General Boldero had strewed so plentifully over Godfrey Stubbs's antecedents and surroundings. His future son-in-law was well-born and well-bred, and his having lately succeeded to a considerable fortune was also well known. Accordingly--we are obliged to add "accordingly"--it was in good taste to say nothing about it. But he could show, and he did show, enough to raise a smile wherever he went. However demure his air when receiving congratulations, he could insert here and there a phrase, adroitly conceived beforehand, the point of which could not be missed--and he was rampant at home. There he might freely puff and blow, and turn his little world upside down. Nothing, not the veriest trifles of every-day life escaped his touch; and had it not been that the sympathies of all were with him, that there was not an antagonistic member of the family or household, he would have been found unbearable.