‘Oh no,’ cried Winifred, ‘it’s silly.’

‘Not at all. It is a very charming and ordinary attention.’

‘Oh, it is silly,’ protested Winifred, with all the extreme MAUVAISE HONTE of her years. Nevertheless, the idea appealed to her. She wanted very much to carry it out. She flitted round the green-houses and the conservatory looking wistfully at the flowers on their stems. And the more she looked, the more she LONGED to have a bunch of the blossoms she saw, the more fascinated she became with her little vision of ceremony, and the more consumedly shy and self-conscious she grew, till she was almost beside herself. She could not get the idea out of her mind. It was as if some haunting challenge prompted her, and she had not enough courage to