In her position would not almost any one have decided that the right way to move him was by holding him at respectful distance and by indirect talk, with the inevitable drift of events doing the principal work--gradually awakening him to the responsibilities and privileges which his entry into a higher social station implied?
But no time must now be lost; the new way, which experience had revealed, must be taken forthwith and traveled by forced marches.

Before they left the woods she must have led him through all the gradations of domestic climate between their present frosty if kindly winter, and summer, or, at least, a very balmy spring.

From what she knew of his temperament she guessed that once she began to thaw he would forthwith whirl her into July.

She must be prepared to accept that, however--repellent though the thought was--she assured herself it was most repellent.

She prided herself on her skill at catching and checking herself in self-deception; but it somehow did not occur to her to contrast her rather listless previous planning with the energy and interest she at once put into this project for supreme martyrdom, as she regarded it.
When he came back that evening she was ready.