emained under influence
of bromide material and spiritual. But then reality came back. Her aunt
had left out all that mattered--all the feeling, the hate, the love, the
unforgivingness of passionate hearts. She, who knew so little of life,
and had touched only the fringe of love, was yet aware by instinct that
words have as little relation to fact and feeling as coin to the bread it
buys. 'Poor Father!' she thought. 'Poor me! Poor Jon! But I don't
care, I mean to have him!' From the window of her darkened room she saw
"that man" issue from the door below and "prowl" away. If he and her
mother--how would that affect her chance? Surely it must make her father
cling to her more closely, so that he would consent in the end to
anything she wanted, or become reconciled the sooner to what she did
without his knowledge.

She took some earth from the flower-box in the window, and with all her
might flung it after that disappearing figure. It fell short, but the
action did her good.

And a little puff of air came up from Green Street, smelling of petrol,
not sweet.

V

PURELY FORSYTE AFFAIRS

Soames, coming up to the City, with the intention of calling in at Green
Street at the end of his day and taking Fleur back home with him,
suffered from rumination. Sleeping partner that he was, he seldom
visited the City now, but he still had a room of his own at Cuthcott,
Kingson and Forsyte's, and one special clerk and a half assigned to the
management of purely Forsyte affairs. They were somewhat in flux just
now--an auspicious moment for the disposal of house property. And Soames
was unloading the estates of his father and Uncle Roger, and to some
extent of his Uncle Nicholas. His shrewd and matter-of-course probity in
all money concerns had made him something of an autocrat in connection
with these trusts. If Soames thought this or thought that, one had
better save oneself the bother of thinking too. He guaranteed, as it
were, irresponsibility to numerous Forsytes of the third and fourth
generations. His fellow trustees, such as his cousins Roger or Nicholas,
his cousins-in-law Tweetyman and Spender, or his sister Cicely's husband,
all trusted him; he signed first, and where he signed first they signed
after, and nobody was a penny the worse. Just now they were all a good
many pennies the better, and Soames was beginning to see the close of
certain trusts, except for distribution of the income from securit