She felt herself the girl, her sensations were so intensely simple.
Proceeding to an argument, that the earl did not regard her as the Countess of Ormont, or the ceremony at the British Embassy as one serious and binding, she pushed her reason too far: sweet delusion waned.

She waited for some fresh scene to revive it.
Aminta sat unwittingly weaving her destiny.
While she was thus engaged, a carriage was rolling on the more westerly road down to Steignton.

Seated in it were Lady Charlotte Eglett and Matthew Weyburn.

They had met at Arthur Abner's office the previous day.
She went there straight from Lord Ormont's house-agent and upholsterer, to have a queer bit of thunderous news confirmed, that her brother was down at Steignton, refurnishing the house, and not for letting.

She was excited: she treated Arthur Abner's closed-volume reticence as a corroboration of the house-agent's report, and hearing Weyburn speak of his anxiety to see the earl immediately, in order to get release from his duties, proposed a seat in her carriage; for down Steignton way she meant to go, if only as excuse for a view of the old place.