In the hansom she leaned back with a sigh.

Why must a girl pay so dearly for her least escape from routine?
Why could one never do a natural thing without having to screen it behind a structure of artifice?
She had yielded to a passing impulse in going to Lawrence Selden's rooms, and it was so seldom that she could allow herself the luxury of an impulse! This one, at any rate, was going to cost her rather more than she could afford.

She was vexed to see that, in spite of so many years of vigilance, she had blundered twice within five minutes.

That stupid story about her dress-maker was bad enough--it would have been so simple to tell Rosedale that she had been taking tea with Selden! The mere statement of the fact would have rendered it innocuous.

But, after having let herself be surprised in a falsehood, it was doubly stupid to snub the witness of her discomfiture.