had nothing whatever to do
with the body. He felt certain of that.

When he got home from the Club he found on his table a note from Beryl
Van Tuyn:

HYDE PARK HOTEL, Thursday.

My dear Mr. Craven,--What a pity you couldn't get away last night.
But you were quite right to play Squire of Dames to our dear Lady
Sellingworth. We had a rather wonderful evening after you had gone. Dick
Garstin was in his best vein. Green chartreuse brings out his genius in
a wonderful way. I wish it would do for me what it does for him. But
I have tried it--in small doses--quite in vain. He and I walked home
together and talked of everything under the stars. I believe he is going
to paint me. Next time you make your way to the Bella Napoli we might
go together. Two lovers of Italy must always feel at home there, and
the sight of Vesuvius is encouraging, I think. So don't forget that my
"beat," as you call it, often lies in Soho.

Isn't dear Adela Sellingworth delightful? She looked like a wonderful
antique in that Italian frame. I love every line in her face and would
give my best bronze to have white hair like hers. But somehow I am
almost glad she didn't fall to the Cafe Royal. She is right. It is too
Georgian for her. She is, as she says, definitely Edwardian and would
scarcely understand the new jargon which comes as easily as how d'you do
to _our_ lips.

By the way, coming out of the Cafe Royal last night I saw a living
bronze.--Yours,

BERYL VAN TUYN.

This note half amused and half irritated Craven on a first reading. On
a second reading irritation predominated in him. Miss Van Tuyn's
determined relegation of Lady Sellingworth to the past seemed somehow
to strike at him, to make him--or to intend to make him--ridiculous; and
her deliberate classing of him with herself in the underlined "_our_"
seemed rather like an attempt to assert authority, the authority of
youth over him. But no doubt this was very natural. Craven was quite
sure that Miss Van Tuyn cared nothing about him. But he was a not
disagreeable and quite presentable young man; he had looked into her
violet eyes, had pressed her hand, had held it longer than was at all
necessary, had in fact shown that he was just a young man and easily
susceptible; and so she did not choose to let an elderly woman take
possession of him even for an hour without sharpening a weapon or two
and bringing them into use.

No wonder that men are conceited when women so swiftly take