ened the bond that for the time held the two ladies
together, distilled in short its drop of rosecolour for
Mrs. Lowder's own view. That was really the view
Milly had, for most of the rest of the occasion, to
give herself to immediately taking in; but it didn't
prevent the continued play of those swift cross-
lights, odd beguilements of the mind, at which we
have already glanced.

Mrs. Lowder herself found it enough simply to
reply, in respect to Kate, that she was indeed a lux
ury to take about the world: she expressed no
more surprise than that at her " Tightness " to-day.
Wasn't it by this time sufficiently manifest that it
was precisely as the very luxury she was proving
that she had, from far back, been appraised and
waited for? Crude elation, however, might be kept
at bay, and the circumstance none the less demon
strated that they were all swimming together in the
blue. It came back to Lord Mark again, as he
seemed slowly to pass and repass and conveniently
to linger before them; he was personally the note
of the blue like a suspended skein of silk within
reach of the broiderer's hand. Aunt Maud's free-
moving shuttle took a length of him at rhythmic in
tervals; and one of the intermixed truths that flick
ered across to Milly was that he ever so consentingly
knew he was being worked in. This was almost like
an understanding with her at Mrs. Lowder's ex
pense, which she would have none of; she wouldn't
for the world have had him make any such point as

[[234]]

p233 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p234w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p235

v?