No answer came. And such rage against men flared up
that she just stood there, twisting her garden-gloves in her hands, and
biting the lips he would have kissed. Then, going to her bureau, she
took up her address book and looked for the name: Wing, 88, Frankland
Street, Fulham. Unhooking her little bag from off the back of the chair,
she put her cheque-book into it. Then, taking care to make no sound, she
passed into the hall, caught up her sunshade, and went out, closing the
door without noise.

She walked quickly toward Baker Street. Her gardening-hat was right
enough, but she had come out without gloves, and must go into the first
shop and buy a pair. In the choosing of them, she forgot her emotions
for a minute. Out in the street again, they came back as bitterly as
ever. And the day was so beautiful--the sun bright, the sky blue, the
clouds dazzling white; from the top of her 'bus she could see all its
brilliance. There rose up before her the memory of the man who had
kissed her arm at the first ball. And now--this! But, mixed with her
rage, a sort of unwilling compassion and fellow feeling kept rising for
that girl, that silly, sugar-plum girl, brought to such a pass by--her
husband. These feelings sustained her through that voyage to Fulham. She
got down at the nearest corner, walked up a widish street of narrow grey
houses till she came to number eighty-eight. On that newly scrubbed
step, waiting for the door to open, she very nearly turned and fled.
What exactly had she come to do?

The door was opened by a servant in an untidy frock. Mutton! The smell
of mutton--there it was, just as the girl had said!

"Is Miss--Miss Daphne Wing at home?"

In that peculiar "I've given it up" voice of domestics in small
households, the servant answered:

"Yes; Miss Disey's in. D'you want to see 'er? What nyme?"

Gyp produced her card. The maid looked at it, at Gyp, and at two
brown-painted doors, as much as to say, "Where will you have it?" Then,
opening the first of them, she said:

"Tyke a seat, please; I'll fetch her."

Gyp went in. In the middle of what was clearly the dining-room, she
tried to subdue the tremor of her limbs and a sense of nausea. The table
against which her hand rested was covered with red baize, no doubt to
keep the stains of mutton from penetrating to the wood. On the mahogany
sideboard reposed a cruet-stand and a green dish of very red apples. A
bamboo-framed talc screen pai