Shelton passed ladies in ones and twos and threes going out shopping, or to classes of drawing, cooking, ambulance. Hardly any men were seen, and they were mostly policemen; but a few disillusioned children were being wheeled towards the Park by fresh-cheeked nurses, accompanied by a great army of hairy or of hairless dogs. There was something of her brother's large liberality about Mrs. Shelton, a tiny lady with affectionate eyes, warm cheeks, and chilly feet; fond as a cat of a chair by the fire, and full of the sympathy that has no insight. She kissed her son at once with rapture, and, as usual, began to talk of his engagement. For the first time a tremor of doubt ran through her son; his mother's view of it grated on him like the sight of a blue-pink dress; it was too rosy. Her splendid optimism, damped him; it had too little traffic with the reasoning powers. “What right,” he asked himself, “has she to be so certain? It seems to me a kind of blasphemy.” “The dear!” she cooed. “And she is coming back to-morrow? Hurrah! how I long to see her!” “But you know, mother, we've agreed not to meet again until July.” Mrs. Shelton rocked her foot, and, holding her head on one side like a little bird, looked at her son with shining eyes. “Dear old Dick!” she said, “how happy you must be!” Half a century of sympathy with weddings of all sorts--good, bad, indifferent--beamed from her. “I suppose,” said Shelton gloomily, “I ought not to go and see her at the station.” “Cheer up!” replied the mother, and her son felt dreadfully depressed. That “Cheer-up!”--the panacea which had carried her blind and bright through every evil--was as void of meaning to him as wine without a flavour. “And how is your sciatica?” he asked. “Oh, pretty bad,” returned his mother; “I expect it's all right, really. Cheer up!” She stretched her little figure, canting her head still more. “Wonderful woman!” Shelton thought. She had, in fact, like many of her fellow-countrymen, mislaid the darker side of things, and, enjoying the benefits of orthodoxy with an easy conscience, had kept as young in heart as any girl of thirty. Shelton left her house as doubtful whether he might meet Antonia as when he entered it. He spent a restless afternoon. The next day--that of her arrival--was a Sunday. He had made Ferrand a promise to go with him to hear a sermon in the slums, and, catching at any diversion which might allay excitement, he fulfilled it. The preacher in question--an amateur, so Ferrand told him--had an original method of distributing the funds that he obtained. To male sheep he gave nothing, to ugly female sheep a very little, to pretty female sheep the rest. Ferrand hazarded an inference, but he was a foreigner. The Englishman preferred to look upon the preacher as guided by a purely abstract love of beauty. His eloquence, at any rate, was unquestionable, and Shelton came out feeling sick.