Seeing that they believed me bound by some childish promise to my cousin Theobald that was not very likely.

And I could not explain to them why I had gone out on the balcony alone with Richard Dawson.
My memory of the time after that seems to consist of nothing but a string of Dawsons coming and going.

I did not know what to make of it.
Surely the propitiation of the Dawsons did not mean that we should see so very much of them.

They were alone now, their fine friends having gone back to London, and their being alone involved an intimacy which need not have been if there were a crowd.
My godmother at this time was much occupied, her cousin, Miss Joan, having developed a disease which in time was to prove mortal, so she knew less of how much the Dawsons came and went, though she must have known it, for I've no doubt the county talked of it.

We had been so sure that we would never admit the Dawsons no matter what any one else did, nor any persons who were merely rich.