attributed to him which had
seemed so incongruous--existed. He spoke with a new fire when she led
him that way, albeit she suspected that some of the fuel was derived
from the revelation that she shared his liking for books. As the extent
of his reading became gradually disclosed, however, her feeling of
inadequacy grew, and she resolved in the future to make better use of
her odd moments. On her table, in two green volumes, was the life of a
Massachusetts statesman that Mrs. Shorter had lent her. She picked it up
after Chiltern had gone. He had praised it.

He left behind him a blurred portrait on her mind, as that of two
men superimposed. And only that morning he had had such a distinct
impression of one. It was from a consideration of this strange
phenomenon, with her book lying open in her lap, that her maid aroused
her to go to Mrs. Pryor's. This was Tuesday.

Some of the modern inventions we deem most marvellous have been fitted
for ages to man and woman. Woman, particularly, possesses for instance
a kind of submarine bell; and, if she listens, she can at times hear
it tinkling faintly. And the following morning, Wednesday, Honora heard
hers when she received an invitation to lunch at Mrs. Shorter's. After
a struggle, she refused, but Mrs. Shorter called her up over the
telephone, and she yielded.

"I've got Alfred Dewing for myself," said Elsie Shorter, as she greeted
Honora in the hall. "He writes those very clever things--you've read
them. And Hugh for you," she added significantly.

The Shorter cottage, though commodious, was simplicity itself. From the
vine-covered pergola where they lunched they beheld the distant sea like
a lavender haze across the flats. And Honora wondered whether there were
not an element of truth in what Mr. Dewing said of their hostess--that
she thought nothing immoral except novels with happy endings. Chiltern
did not talk much: he looked at Honora.

"Hugh has got so serious," said Elsie Shorter, "that sometimes I'm
actually afraid of him. You ought to have done something to be as
serious as that, Hugh."

"Done something!"

"Written the 'Origin of Species,' or founded a new political party, or
executed a coup d'etat. Half the time I'm under the delusion that I'm
entertaining a celebrity under my roof, and I wake up and it's only
Hugh."

"It's because he looks as though he might do any of those things,"
suggested Mr. Deming. "Perhaps he may."

"Oh," said Elsie Shorter, "the