“I should think it would be rather nice. But wouldn’t it be awfully hot? I’ve known one or two boys in the Indian Army. There’s lots of dancing and that sort of thing, isn’t there?” He laughed. Dancing wasn’t his strong point, as Professor Beagle could have told her, and in any case India didn’t mean dancing to him. She did not seem at all anxious to pursue the subject. “I think we could walk back to the hotel now,” she said. “I’m simply starving.” They walked down the hill together, almost in silence. When they reached the hotel, she disappeared in the company of the barmaid, leaving Edwin to wait for her in the coffee-room. He almost resented her absence. He felt that he couldn’t spare her for a moment. Waiting at the table he picked up a week-old copy of the _North Bromwich Courier_. Gazing idly at the front page, he caught sight of his own name. It was the announcement of a wedding. INGLEBY: FELLOWS. On the tenth of December, at the Parish Church, Halesby, John Ingleby to Julia, elder daughter of the late Joseph Fellows, of Mawne, Staffs. He was overwhelmed with a sudden indescribable emotion that was neither jealousy, anger, nor shame, but curiously near to all three. He sat bewildered, with the paper in front of him. Rosie returned to find him blankly staring. “Why, what’s the matter with you? You look as if you’d seen a ghost.” “Yes. . . . I think I have. It’s nothing, really. Nothing at all.” He drank more than he need have done of a villainous wine that was labelled _Château Margaux_, but had probably been pressed on the hot hill-sides of Oran. In the train, on the way home, he felt flushed and sleepy, but, all the time, divinely conscious of the warmth and softness of Rosie sitting beside him. They were alone in the first-class carriage. “I’m sleepy too,” she said. He drew her gently to his side, and she rested, content, with her head on his shoulder. In the wonder of this he forgot the newspaper and its staggering contents. As they neared North Bromwich she stood up in front of the mirror to arrange her hair, and Edwin, pulling himself together, saw that his blue coat was floured with a fine bloom of powder. She still found it difficult to walk, and so they drove in a hansom to Prince Albert’s Place, very grimy and sinister in the dusk. “You needn’t ring,” she said, taking out a latchkey and showing him into the narrow hall. “Let’s be very quiet, so as not to disturb mother.” “I don’t think I’ll come in,” he said. He knew that he must make an end somewhere. “Not even to be thanked? I’ve enjoyed myself most awfully.” She stood before him in the gloom of the hall as though she were waiting for something. It felt as if the dark space between them must break into flame. Their lips met. “Good God! . . . how wonderful you are!” he said. “Next week,” she whispered. III