her, she had to squeeze ten shillings out of the weekly bills--a matter
difficult in times of peace and more difficult in war time. It was a
difficulty she meant to overcome.

Now on this Friday morning, after the Sale, Mrs. Potten motored into
Oxford rather earlier than usual. She intended going to the Lodgings at
King's before doing her shopping. Her reason for going to the Lodgings
was an interesting one. She had just had a letter from Lady Belinda
Scott, informing her that, even if she had been able to invite Gwendolen
for Monday, Gwendolen could not accept the invitation, as the dear child
was going to stay on at the Lodgings indefinitely. She was engaged to be
married to the Warden! At this point in the letter Mrs. Potten put the
paper upon the breakfast table and felt that the world was grey. Mrs.
Potten liked men she admired to be bachelors or else widowers, either
would do. She liked to feel that if only she had been ten years younger,
and had not been so exclusively devoted to the memory of her husband,
things might have---- She never allowed herself to state definitely,
even to herself, what they might have----, but as long as they might
have----, there was over the world in which Mrs. Potten moved and
thought a subtle veil of emotional possibilities.

So he was engaged! And what exasperated Mrs. Potten, as she read on, was
Lady Belinda's playful hints that Lady Dashwood (dear old thing!) had
manoeuvred Gwendolen's visit in the first instance, and then kept her
firmly a prisoner till the knot was tied. Hadn't it been clever? Then as
to the Warden, he was madly, romantically in love, and what could a
mother do but resign herself to the inevitable? It wasn't what she had
hoped for Gwen! It was very, very different--very! She must not trust
herself to speak on that subject because she had given her consent and
the thing was done, and she meant to make the best of it loyally.

With this news surging in her head Mrs. Potten raced along the moist
roadways towards the ancient and sacred city.

Lena ought to have told her about this engagement when they were sitting
together in the rooms at Christ Church. It wasn't the right thing for an
old friend to have preserved a mysterious silence, unless (Mrs. Potten
was a woman with her wits about her) the engagement had been not Lady
Dashwood's plan, but exclusively Belinda's plan and the daughter's plan,
and the Warden had been "caught"!

"A liar," said Mrs. Potten, a