He sent them about their business harshly, abominably rude, leaving a wake of angry disturbance behind him, sowing the seeds of future quarrels and renewed unpopularity.

He was looking for Hilma Tree.
When at last he came unexpectedly upon her, standing near where Mrs.
Tree was seated, some half-dozen young men hovering uneasily in her neighbourhood, all his audacity was suddenly stricken from him; his gruffness, his overbearing insolence vanished with an abruptness that left him cold.

His old-time confusion and embarrassment returned to him.
Instead of speaking to her as he intended, he affected not to see her, but passed by, his head in the air, pretending a sudden interest in a Japanese lantern that was about to catch fire.
But he had had a single distinct glimpse of her, definite, precise, and this glimpse was enough.

Hilma had changed.

The change was subtle, evanescent, hard to define, but not the less unmistakable.