Life is like some crazy machine that is always going either tooslow or too fast. From the cradle to the grave we alternate betweenthe Sargasso Sea and the rapids--forever either becalmed orstorm-tossed. It seemed to Maud, as she looked across thedinner-table in order to make sure for the twentieth time that itreally was George Bevan who sat opposite her, that, after months inwhich nothing whatever had happened, she was now living through aperiod when everything was happening at once. Life, from being abroken-down machine, had suddenly begun to race.

　　To the orderly routine that stretched back to the time when she hadbeen hurried home in disgrace from Wales there had succeeded a madwhirl of events, to which the miracle of tonight had come as afitting climax. She had not begun to dress for dinner till somewhatlate, and had consequently entered the drawing-room just as Keggswas announcing that the meal was ready. She had received her firstshock when the love-sick Plummer, emerging from a mixed crowd ofrelatives and friends, had informed her that he was to take her in.

　　She had not expected Plummer to be there, though he lived in theneighbourhood. Plummer, at their last meeting, had stated hisintention of going abroad for a bit to mend his bruised heart: andit was a little disconcerting to a sensitive girl to find hervictim popping up again like this. She did not know that, as far asPlummer was concerned, the whole affair was to be considered openedagain. To Plummer, analysing the girl's motives in refusing him,there had come the idea that there was Another, and that this othermust be Reggie Byng. From the first he had always looked uponReggie as his worst rival. And now Reggie had bolted with theFaraday girl, leaving Maud in excellent condition, so it seemed toPlummer, to console herself with a worthier man. Plummer knew allabout the Rebound and the part it plays in the affairs of theheart. His own breach-of-promise case two years earlier had beenentirely due to the fact that the refusal of the youngest Devenishgirl to marry him had caused him to rebound into the dangeroussociety of the second girl from the O.P. end of the first row inthe "Summertime is Kissing-time" number in the Alhambra revue. Hehad come to the castle tonight gloomy, but not without hope.

　　Maud's second shock eclipsed the first entirely. No notificationhad been given to her either by her father or by Percy of theproposed extension of the hand of hospitality to George, and thesight of him standing there talking to her aunt Caroline made hermomentarily dizzy. Life, which for several days had had all theproperties now of a dream, now of a nightmare, became more unrealthan ever. She could conceive no explanation of George's presence.

　　He could not be there--that was all there was to it; yet thereundoubtedly he was. Her manner, as she accompanied Plummer down thestairs, took on such a dazed sweetness that her escort felt that incoming there that night he had done the wisest act of a lifetimestudded but sparsely with wise acts. It seemed to Plummer that thisgirl had softened towards him. Certainly something had changed her.