It must have happened then, thought Mrs. Ramsay; they are engaged. And for a moment she felt what she had never expected to feel again⁠—jealousy. For he, her husband, felt it too⁠—Minta’s glow; he liked these girls, these golden-reddish girls, with something flying, something a little wild and harum-scarum about them, who didn’t “scrape their hair off,” weren’t, as he said about poor Lily Briscoe, “skimpy.” There was some quality which she herself had not, some lustre, some richness, which attracted him, amused him, led him to make favourites of girls like Minta. They might cut his hair for him, plait him watch-chains, or interrupt him at his work, hailing him (she heard them), “Come along, Mr. Ramsay; it’s our turn to beat them now,” and out he came to play tennis.