Several times, twice, at least, Mrs. Gilbert knew it had gone as far as
a private engagement--with Tudor Baird and that Holcome boy at Pasadena.
She was sure it had, because--this must go no further--she had come in
unexpectedly and found Gloria acting, well, very much engaged indeed.
She had not spoken to her daughter, of course. She had had a certain
sense of delicacy and, besides, each time she had expected an
announcement in a few weeks. But the announcement never came; instead, a
new man came.

Scenes! Young men walking up and down the library like caged tigers!
Young men glaring at each other in the hall as one came and the other
left! Young men calling up on the telephone and being hung up upon in
desperation! Young men threatening South America! ... Young men writing
the most pathetic letters! (She said nothing to this effect, but Dick
fancied that Mrs. Gilbert's eyes had seen some of these letters.)

... And Gloria, between tears and laughter, sorry, glad, out of love and
in love, miserable, nervous, cool, amidst a great returning of presents,
substitution of pictures in immemorial frames, and taking of hot baths
and beginning again--with the next.

That state of things continued, assumed an air of permanency. Nothing
harmed Gloria or changed her or moved her. And then out of a clear sky
one day she informed her mother that undergraduates wearied her. She was
absolutely going to no more college dances.

This had begun the change--not so much in her actual habits, for she
danced, and had as many "dates" as ever--but they were dates in a
different spirit. Previously it had been a sort of pride, a matter of
her own vainglory. She had been, probably, the most celebrated and