She did not love him, she could never love him, but he had loved her, angrily, and, in retrospect, the absurd manner of his proposal had a charm. She would have given much to know whether his feeling for her persisted. From the letters read wheezily by Mr. Sales and sometimes handed to her to read for herself, she learnt so little that she was the freer to create a great deal and, riding home, she would break into astonished inward laughter. Rose Mallett playing a game of sentiment! And, crossing the bridge and passing through the streets where she was known to every second person, she had pleasure in the conviction that no one could have guessed what absurdity went on behind the pale, impassive face, what secret and unsuspected amusement she enjoyed; a little comedy of her own! The unsuitability of Francis Sales for the part of hero supplied most of the humour and saved her from loss of dignity. The thing was obviously absurd; she had never cared for dolls, but in her young womanhood she was finding amusement in the manipulation of a puppet. The death of Mr. Sales in the cold March of the next year shocked her from her game. She was sorry he had gone, for she had always liked him, and he seemed to have taken with him the little girl who was fond of pigs, and while Caroline and Sophia mourned the loss of an old friend, Rose was faced with the certainty of his son’s return. She would have to stop her ridiculous imaginings, she must pretend she had never had them for, when she saw him as flesh and blood, her game would be ruined and she would be shamed. The imminence of his arrival reminded her of his dullness, his handsome, sullen face and, more tenderly, of those tears which had put her so oddly in his debt. But she had no difficulty in casting away the false image she had made. She was, she found, glad to be rid of it; she liked to feel herself delivered of a weakness. But she need not have been in such a hurry, for it was some months before the man who brought the milk from Sales Hall also brought the news that the master was returning. This information was handed to Caroline and Sophia with their early tea. Sitting up in bed and looking grotesquely terrible, they discussed the event. Caroline, like Medusa, but with hair curlers instead of snakes sprouting from her head, and Sophia with her heavy plait hanging over her shoulder and defying with its luxuriance the yellowness of her skin, they sat side by side, propped up with pillows, inured to the sight of each other in undress. “He has come back!” Sophia said ecstatically. “Perhaps after all—” “Oh, nonsense!” Caroline said as usual, “she’s meant for better things. My dear, she was born for a great affair. She ought to be the mistress of a king. Yes, something of that kind, with her looks, her phlegm.” “But there are no kings in Radstowe,” Sophia said, “and I don’t think you ought to say such things.”