And now, she thought pettishly, he had spoiled all this, and what annoyed her almost as much was that the change was more in herself than in him.  She no longer gave him commissions to execute for her, nor made him her general confidant.  She knew that he would be as ready as before to laugh and to sympathise, that he would still gladly execute her commissions, and she felt that he tried hard to make her forget that he had aspired to be something nearer to her than a brotherly friend.  She felt that after what he had said they could never stand in quite the same relation as before.

Accustomed as Frank was to read her thoughts, he was not deceived by the expression of regret that she should now see but little of him, as he saw the news was really pleasant to her.  She was not aware that it was a conversation that he had had the evening before with Colonel Severn, which had decided him to go down to the Osprey a fortnight earlier than he had intended.

“You are getting to be almost as regular an attendant here, Mallett, as I am.  I think you are altogether too young to take regularly to club life.  It is all very well for an old fogey like me, but I don’t think it a good thing for a young fellow like you to take so early to a bachelor life.”

“I don’t want to do anything of the sort, Colonel.  But I can’t stand these crushes in hot rooms; I cannot for the life of me see where the pleasure comes in.  I begin to think that I was an ass to leave the army.”

“Not at all, lad, not at all.  When a man has got a good estate it is much better for him to settle down upon it, and to marry and have children, and all that sort of thing, than it is to remain in the army in times of peace.  I had Wilson and Hawley dining with me here yesterday.  We had a great chat over the pleasant time we had last year on board your yacht.  I don’t know when I enjoyed myself so much as I did then.  Lady Greendale is a remarkably clever woman, and her daughter is as nice a girl as I have come across for a long time, and without a scrap of nonsense about her.  I wonder that she has not become engaged by this time.  General Matthews, who, as you know, goes in a good deal for that sort of thing for the sake of his daughters, told me recently that he fancied from what he had heard that Miss Greendale’s engagement was likely to be a settled thing before the season was over.  He said there were three men making the running—­Lord Chilson, the eldest son of the Earl of Sommerlay; George Delamore—­his father is in the Cabinet, you know, and he is member for Ponberry; and a man named Carthew, who keeps race horses, and was a neighbour of hers down in the country.  He is, I hear, a good-looking fellow, and just the sort of man a girl is likely to fancy.  Matthews thought that the chances were in his favour.  As you are a neighbour of theirs, too, I suppose you will know him?”

“I knew him at one time, Colonel, but I have not seen him now for a good many years, beyond meeting him two or three times at dinners and so on last season.  He was away when I was at home before going out to India, and he had sold his estate before I came back.”