“So you would go away if you thought that she took any warmer interest in you than ladies generally do in men engaged to be married.”

“Certainly I should.”

“Well, then, I think that I can set your mind at ease.  I have observed Mrs. Carr pretty closely, and in the way you suppose she cares for you no more than she does for your coat.  She is, no doubt, a bit of a flirt, and very likely wishes to get you to fall in love with her—­a natural ambition on the part of a woman; but, as for being in love with you herself, the idea is absurd.  Women of the world do not fall in love so readily; they are too much taken up with thinking about themselves to have time to think about anybody else.  With them it is all self, self, self, from morning till night.  Besides, look at the common-sense side of the thing.  Do you suppose it likely that a person of Mrs. Carr’s wealth and beauty, who has only to lift her hand to have all London at her feet, is likely to fix her affections upon a young man whom she knows is already engaged to be married, and who—­ forgive me if I say so—­has not got the same recommendations to her favour that many of her suitors have?  It is, of course, quite possible that Mrs. Carr’s society may be dangerous to you, in which case it might be wise for you to go; but I really do not think that you need feel any anxiety on her account.  She finds you a charming companion, and in some ways a useful one, and that is all.  When you go, somebody else will soon fill the vacant space.”

“Then that’s all right,” said Arthur, though somehow he did not feel as wildly delighted as he should have done at hearing it so clearly demonstrated that Mildred did not care a brass button about him; but then that is human nature.  Between eighteen and thirty-five, ninety per cent. of the men in the world would like to centre in themselves the affections of every young and pretty woman they know, even if there was not the ghost of a chance of their marrying one of them.  The same tendency is to be observed conversely in the other sex, only in their case with a still smaller proportion of exceptions.

“By the way,” asked Arthur, presently, “how is my late guardian, Mr. George Caresfoot?”

“Not at all well, I am sorry to say.  I am very anxious about his health.  He is in the south of England now for a change.”

“I am sorry he is ill.  Do you know, I daresay you will think me absurd; but you have taken a weight off my mind.  I always had an idea that he wanted to marry Angela, and sometimes I am afraid that I have suspected that Philip Caresfoot carted me off in order to give him a chance.  You see, Philip is uncommonly fond of money, and George is rich.”

“What an absurd idea, Mr. Heigham!  Why, George looks upon matrimony as an institution of the evil one.  He admires Angela, I know—­he always does admire a pretty face; but as for dreaming of marrying a girl half his age and his own cousin into the bargain, it is about the last thing that he would do.”