One Sunday afternoon, as the sun was making rainbows in the cloud of spray thrown from the fountain in Kew Gardens, Sholto Douglas appeared there amongst the promenaders on the banks of the pond. He halted on the steps leading down to the basin, gazing idly at the waterfowl paddling at his feet. A lady in a becoming grey dress came to the top of the steps, and looked curiously at him. Somehow aware of this, he turned indifferently, as if to leave, and found that the lady was Marian. Her ripened beauty, her perfect self-possession, a gain in her as of added strength and wisdom, and a loss in her as of gentleness outgrown and timidity overcome, dazzled him for a moment—caused a revulsion in him which he half recognized as the beginning of a dangerous passion. His former love for her suddenly appeared boyish and unreal to him; and this ruin of a once cherished illusion cost him a pang. Meanwhile, there she was, holding out her hand and smiling with a cool confidence in the success of her advance that would have been impossible to Marian Lind.
“How do you do?” she said.
“Thank you: I am fairly well. You are quite well, I hope?”
“I am in rude health. I hardly knew you at first.”
“Am I altered?”
“You are growing stout.”
“Indeed? Time has not been so bounteous to me as to you.”
“You mean that I am stouter than you?” She laughed; and the sound startled him. He got from it an odd impression that her soul was gone. But he hastened to protest.
“No, no. You know I do not. I meant that you have achieved the impossible—altered for the better.”
“I am glad you think so. I cling to my good looks desperately now that I am growing matronly. How is Mrs. Douglas?”