A thought flitted over his mind which he was too loyal to formulate.

Once he and his wife had had similar likings, but they had taken different roads since their child died.

Janet! He saw again--he was never quite free from the sight--the solemn little white-frocked girl who had died long ago in the Spring.
It may have been the thought of the Neuk Hydropathic, or more likely the thin clean scent of the daffodils with which Tibby had decked the table, but long ere breakfast was finished the Great Plan had ceased to be an airy vision and become a sober well-masoned structure.

Mr.
McCunn--I may confess it at the start--was an incurable romantic.
He had had a humdrum life since the day when he had first entered his uncle's shop with the hope of some day succeeding that honest grocer; and his feet had never strayed a yard from his sober rut.

But his mind, like the Dying Gladiator's, had been far away.