This was admitted.

“You are not engaged to any one?”

“Oh, no!”

“And have never tried that position?”

“No, oh, no!”

“That shocks you,” said Anne, with a laugh. “My dear, it often happens to me.”

“Not seriously?”

“Quite seriously.” She leant back and watched Millie’s face with amusement. “Are you disgusted?”

“Why—why do you do it? I can’t understand.”

“It comes somehow, often really without my intending. It’s the way of my kind, I suppose. For one thing, how is one to know a man at all until one is engaged? And so often I can’t tell beforehand whether I like them well enough or not. As you see, it has generally ended by my discovering that it would be intolerable. I don’t pretend that there have not been other reasons,” she added frankly. “Riches sometimes fly away on nearer approach.”