One notices that when a woman takes action in this
incomprehensible way her lady friends are never surprised; they seem to
have some subtle sympathy with her. It is only the men who look puzzled,
as if the ground beneath their feet were unstable. Therefore there must
be some influence at work, probably the same influence, under different
forms, which urges women to those strange, inconsequent actions by which
their lives are rendered miserable. Men have not found it out yet.
Anna Hethbridge was at this time twenty-four years of age, rather pretty,
with a vivacity of manner which only seemed frivolous to the more
thoughtful of her acquaintances. The idea of her marrying old Squire Agar
within six months of the untimely death of her clever lover, Seymour
Michael, seemed so preposterous that her hostess, good, sentimental Mrs.
Glynde, never dreamt of such a possibility until, in the form of a fact,
it was confided to her by Miss Hethbridge, one afternoon soon after her
arrival at the rectory.
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