According to them there was no hope of her being scratched or left at the post.
"She'll run like a scared hearse-horse," said young Grandcourt gloomily.
There was reason for his gloom.

Unknown to his father he had invested heavily in Dysart's schemes.

It was his father's contempt that he feared more than ruin.
So Dysart had gone to town, leaving behind him the utter indifference of a wife, the deep contempt of a man; and a white-faced girl alone with her memories--whatever they might be--and her thoughts, which were painful if one might judge by her silent, rigid abstraction, and the lower lip which, at moments, escaped, quivering, from the close-set teeth.
When Duane rose, folding his paper with a carelessly pleasant word or two, she looked up in a kind of naive terror--like a child startled at prospect of being left alone.

It was curious how those adrift seemed always to glide his way.

It had always been so; even stray cats followed him in the streets; unhappy dogs trotted persistently at his heels; many a journey had he made to the Bide-a-wee for some lost creature's sake; many a softly purring cat had he caressed on his way through life--many a woman.
As he strolled toward the eastern end of the terrace, Sylvia looked after him; and, suddenly, unable to endure isolation, she rose and followed as instinctively as her lesser sisters-errant.
It was the trotting of little footsteps behind him on the gravel that arrested him.