ter than his
wont. In Leicester Square the passage of a Personage between two
stations blocked the traffic, and on the footways were gathered a crowd
of simple folk with much in their hearts and little in their stomachs,
who raised a cheer as the Personage passed. Mrs. Pendyce looked eagerly
from her cab, for she too loved a show.

The crowd dispersed, and the cab went on.

It was the first time she had ever found herself in the business
apartment of any professional man less important than a dentist. From the
little waiting-room, where they handed her the Times, which she could not
read from excitement, she caught sight of rooms lined to the ceilings
with leather books and black tin boxes, initialed in white to indicate
the brand, and of young men seated behind lumps of paper that had been
written on. She heard a perpetual clicking noise which roused her
interest, and smelled a peculiar odour of leather and disinfectant which
impressed her disagreeably. A youth with reddish hair and a pen in his
hand passed through and looked at her with a curious stare immediately
averted. She suddenly felt sorry for him and all those other young men
behind the lumps of paper, and the thought went flashing through her
mind, 'I suppose it's all because people can't agree.'

She was shown in to Mr. Paramor at last. In his large empty room, with
its air of past grandeur, she sat gazing at three La France roses in a
tumbler of water with the feeling that she would never be able to begin.

Mr. Paramor's eyebrows, which jutted from his clean, brown face like
little clumps of pothooks, were iron-grey, and iron-grey his hair brushed
back from his high forehead. Mrs. Pendyce wondered why he looked five
years younger than Horace, who was his junior, and ten years younger than
Charles, who, of course, was younger still. His eyes, which from
iron-grey some inner process of spiritual manufacture had made into steel
colour, looked young too, although they were grave; and the smile which
twisted up the corners of his mouth looked very young.

"Well," he said, "it's a great pleasure to see you."

Mrs. Pendyce could only answer with a smile.

Mr. Paramor put the roses to his nose.

"Not so good as yours," he said, "are they? but the best I can do."

Mrs. Pendyce blushed with pleasure.

"My garden is looking so beautiful----" Then, remembering that she no
longer had a garden, she stopped; but remembering also that, though she
had los