"If only you'd interfered with us all a little more, darling, how much happier we should have been," said Beatrix. "What Caroline and I think is that she never could _quite_ make up her mind, and he wouldn't say anything till he saw that she had." "That's how it's supposed to have happened with _you_, isn't it? It isn't every man who expects the woman he's in love with to fall down and cuddle his boots." "Don't be tart, darling. It doesn't suit you, really, though you think it does." "She found out after all that she wanted somebody younger," said Caroline. "Yes, that's what _you'd_ think. The truth of it is you've both been scratching each other's backs. 'Of course he'd want what Dick wanted in you, _darling_,' and 'Of course she'd want somebody more like Maurice, _dearie_.' To any sensible woman George is worth Dick and Maurice put together. Well, I don't know what has happened. I think she would have had him a month ago, if he'd asked her. I've hardly seen her since. At any rate, it's all over. George won't marry now. This was the only chance. He wouldn't marry for the sake of marrying, and he wouldn't go about looking for somebody to fall in love with. You've stopped his doing either, till it's too late. But with somebody provided for him, so to speak, who would just suit him, and could make him fall in love with her into the bargain--it would have been simply ideal. Now the poor man has got to fly off and forget all about it. Of course he won't forget all about it for a long time. He'll feel himself old all of a sudden, and know that he'll have to go on getting older for the rest of his life. I'm furious about it." Caroline and Beatrix went on to see Lady Handsworth. They agreed on the way there that Aunt Mary was really rather sweet about their father, though she always tried to be too clever. It _was_ hard lines on the poor old darling, and they would have to do their best to prevent him feeling he was getting old. It seemed that he actually had run away. Uncle James had said that somebody from the Bank was to have been sent to Spain in a day or two, but that he had suddenly announced his intention of going himself, immediately. He had said nothing about the engagement, but he must have known of it when he made his decision, as he had written to Beatrix that afternoon. Lady Handsworth was concerned about the news. "I did hope that she would have married your father," she said. "But I never felt quite so sure about it as Mary, and others, have. I think she could never quite make up her mind. Sir John Ambleside has been rather determined in his wooing, and I suppose it came to a point where George held back, not liking to put himself into rivalry with a much younger man." "I think that's much the most likely thing to have happened," said Caroline. "But he did love her, I'm pretty sure, and I'm most awfully sorry for him."