And then Dolff. Janet did not feel, as Mrs. Harwood had indiscreetly said, that the sight of the pair “philandering” had brought the water into her mouth. Meredith, with his confidences and the curious doubt she had of him, was too interesting for that. She did not envy Gussy, nor feel the least desire to be in the same situation. What sentiment she had on the subject was a troubled pity for Gussy; but even that only in the background; her curiosity and interest and doubt in respect to Meredith himself being her chief feelings. And Dolff, for a time, had only been an interruption to the other study. But now it was evident that matters were getting serious, and that it was necessary for Janet to take into consideration whither she was going. The ball was a great event in front of her, which might bring with it serious consequences. Balls are but frivolous things, but yet they are sometimes fraught with events of the deepest importance. Miss Harwood, as we know, with ideas far from frivolous, looked forward to this merry-making as perhaps the most serious moment of her life. Janet had not the same feeling, but she was excited and a little disturbed. If Dolff should ask her--whatever he might have to ask: what would happen? The reader is aware that Janet at the very outset of her career had been brought face to face with a similar problem, which she had solved very summarily without taking much time for thought. But the circumstances now were a little different. Dolff was young (too young, for he was only twenty-two): there was no disparity in that point of view: and whereas, in the first instance, the only drawback in refusing was the breaking of poor Dr. Harding’s heart--a contingency at which Janet was disposed to laugh in the cruelty of her youth--the matter was complicated now by the possibility that she would herself suffer by the necessity of giving up a situation that suited her, where she was comfortable and interested. This probability did not please her at all. To leave St. John’s Wood, not to be able to follow the curious romance to its end, not to know how things arranged themselves between Gussy and Meredith, to be cut sheer off from that thread of story which it was so exciting to watch as it twisted itself out day by day--Janet was very unwilling to contemplate such a possibility. And then there came upon her, as if blown upon the fresh winterly breeze which puffed in at her open window, the half-forgotten talk of Clover--the conversations that used to go on by the fire at Rose Cottage in the afternoon, when half-a-dozen ladies would drop in to tea. How severe they were upon a girl who was so fantastic as not to accept a good offer! How they would prophesy that she would never have such another--how they would ask indignantly what she expected! Janet seemed to hear them all talking together, hoping sarcastically that Mary Brown would never repent her folly.