Mildred got up.
"Go, then," she said.
And she was left alone with the mended photograph of Marie and her spilt tea.
[CHAPTER XVII]
It was a warm bright day of early November, so serene and sunny even in London that it seemed as if the promise of spring rather than any threat of winter was in the air. Leaves still lingered thickly on the plane-trees in the Park, and a sun divinely clear flooded the streets and roadways with unusual light. Shop-boys whistled as they went on their errands, the hoops of children were bowled with alacrity, while their nursemaids smiled on the benignant police who piloted them and their charges over perilous crossings. London, moreover, was rather full; that is to say, a few hundreds who would not otherwise have been there had joined the patient millions who were never anywhere else, for Parliament had met, and a three-lined whip had been flogging the laggards back to their places from partridge-drive and pheasant-shoot. For this reason, the columns of "Diana" had been particularly sprightly, and all the world might read with rapture that Lady Ardingly had returned with her husband to Pall Mall; that Lord Alston with his wife, "who looked quite charming in a guipure hat trimmed with sassafras"—or the effect of such words—were in Park Lane; that Lord Brereton with his wife, "whom I saw driving two spirited colts in the Park yesterday," had returned to Grosvenor Square. "Cupid's Bow," also, had reported the marriage of the daughter to Mr. Anthony Maxwell only three days before, and "Diana" had been graciously pleased to express satisfaction at the presents, knew, of course, how delighted everybody was, and what the bride's travelling dress was like; in fact, there was no doubt whatever about it.
The spirited colt business was also authentic, and the morning after this announcement had appeared it so happened that Mildred was driving them again. The carriage was of a light-phaeton type, with a seat for the groom behind, and the two cobs—"Diana" had miscalled them—took it like a feather. On the whole, Mildred had had a pleasanter autumn that she had thought possible. She had stayed at several entertaining houses, had picked up several new friends and dropped several old ones. Her method of dropping old friends was always admirable. She never hurled them violently away; she merely opened her fingers and let them fall gently to the ground, never quarrelling with them, but just becoming unconscious of their existence. Then she had been at Aix for a fortnight, and had explained matters quite satisfactorily to a person who mattered very much, and altogether had rather a success. Afterwards followed Maud's marriage, which left her freer than before (and she had already persuaded herself that the last two seasons had been bondage); and she had invented and learned by heart a little story of how that very odd woman, Marie Alston, had tried to stop it. In its finished form it was quite a pathetic narrative. "But every one must choose for himself what he means to do," it ended, "and if Marie chooses to be malicious, it is her look-out. Dear Marie! I used to be very fond of her. Yes, she has gone off terribly—quite passée, and so young, too. She cannot be more than thirty." This latter was quite true; she was only twenty-six, and Mildred knew it.
Yes, on the whole Mildred congratulated herself. Her appetite for pleasure had not been diminished by the events of this summer, and there was still plenty to feed it. In her superficial way she missed Jack a good deal, but she had got over it in her hard, practical manner, and all that remained to her now of regret had been transformed into implacable anger against him for his desertion. However, she had some charming new friends, and certainly one crowd was very like another crowd. To have your house full, that was the great thing, and to get plenty of invitations to houses that would also be full. She liked eating, and screaming, and laughing, and intriguing; they were still at her command. Externally, to conclude, she was a shade more pronounced; her hair was slightly more Titianesque, her cheeks a little more highly coloured, her mouth a little redder, her eyebrows a little thicker. Most people thought she looked very well, but Lady Ardingly said to herself, "Poor Mildred is beginning to fight for it."