vers both sexes and all
the human race."

She let her eyes go into Craven's.

"Only up till a certain age," said Lady Sellingworth. "When we love to
sit by the fire, we can do very well without it. But we must be careful
to lay up treasure for our old age, mental treasure. We must cultivate
tastes and habits which have nothing to do with wildness. A man in
Sorrento taught me about that."

"A man in Sorrento!" said Miss Van Tuyn, suddenly and sharply on the
alert.

"Yes. He was a famous writer, and had, I dare say, been a famous lover
in his time. One day, as we drove beyond the town towards the hills,
he described to me the compensations old age holds for sensible people.
It's a question of cultivating and preparing the mind, of filling the
storehouse against the day of famine. He had done it, and assured me
that he didn't regret his lost youth or sigh after its unrecoverable
pleasures. He had accustomed his mind to its task."

"What task, dearest?"

"Acting in connexion with the soul--his word that--as a thoroughly
efficient substitute for his body as a pleasure giver."

At this moment the adoring eyes of the three musicians who were
"hairdressers in the daytime" focussed passionately upon Miss Van Tuyn,
distracted her attention. She felt masculinity intent upon her and
responded automatically.

"The dear boys! They are asking if they shall play the Pastorale for me.
Look at their eyes!" she said.

Craven did not bother to do that, but looked instead at hers, wondering
a little at her widespread energy in net casting. Was it possible that
once Lady Sellingworth had been like that, ceaselessly on the
lookout for worship, requiring it as a right, even from men who were
hairdressers in the daytime? As the musicians began to play he met her
eyes again and felt sure that it could not have been so. Whatever she
had done, whatever she had been, she could never have frequented the
back stairs. That thought seemed a rather cruel thrust at Miss Van Tuyn.
But there is a difference in vanities. Wonderful variety of nature!

When the players had finished the Pastorale and "A Mezzanotte," and
had been rewarded by a long look of thanks from Miss Van Tuyn which
evidently drove them over the borders of admiration into the regions
of unfulfilled desire, Lady Sellingworth said she must go. And then an
unexpected thing happened. It appeared that Miss Van Tuyn had asked a
certain famous critic, who though English by birth was