flow on for ever in this quiet place. He seemed to understand it all
so well, and to love it all so dearly. He accepted it all, even its
vulgarest aspects. Even pompous Berkins appeared to him under a
tenderer light--the light of orange-flowers and married love. For Aunt
Mary had smoothed away all difficulties, hirsute and monetary, and the
wedding had been fixed for the autumn. The gaiety of the day he had
spent with the girls, its feasting and its flirtation, arose,
memorised in a soft halo of imagination--a day of fruit, wine, and
light words, and the dear General, with his St James's politics and
his only desire--"a little something to do--something to bring me out,
you know." The pugs, the mangy mastiff, the hospitable house always
open, its ready welcome, and, above all, the air which it held of the
lives of its occupants; its pictures of white arab horses, and
elephants richly caparisoned; the wonderful goats in the field, and
the tropical birds and animals in the back garden! Above all, the
walks on the green with the chemist's wife, and the annoyance such
familiarity caused Mr. Brookes--how funny, how charming, how amusing!
He was smiling through the tears that rose to his eyes when the train
rolled into Brighton.

On arriving in London he drove straight to the Temple. The creaking,
disjointed staircases, with the lanterns of old time in the windows,
jarred his thoughts, which were still of Southwick; and when he
entered his rooms their loneliness struck him with a chill. He
pictured Maggie sitting in the arm-chair waiting for him, and he
imagined how she would lay her book aside and say, "Oh, here you are!"
He sat down to read his letters. One was from Lord Mount Rorke,
enclosing a cheque, another a daintily cut envelope, smelling
daintily, came from Lady Seveley.