d absorption in the tableau presented
by Jean leaning forward, elbow on knee, chin in hand, gazing steadily in
Vida Levering's face.

'I don't want to interrupt you two,' said the hostess, 'but I think you
must look at the pictures.'

'Oh, yes, I brought them specially'--Lord Borrodaile deflected his
course in order to take up from the table two squares of cardboard tied
face to face with tape.

'Bless the man!' Mrs. Freddy contemplated him with smiling affectation
of scorn. 'I mean the new photographs of the children. He's thinking of
some reproductions Herbert Tunbridge got while he was abroad--pictures
of things somebody's unearthed in Sicily or Cyprus.'

'Crete, my dear.' He turned his back on the fond mother and Jean who was
already oh-ing with appreciation at the first of a pile of little Saras
and Cecils. When he came back to his corner of the sofa he made no
motion to undo his packet, but 'Now then!' he said, as he often did on
sitting down beside Vida Levering--as though they had been interrupted
on the verge of coming to an agreement about something.

She, with an instinct of returning the ball, usually tossed at him some
scrap of news or a jest, or some small social judgment. This time when
he uttered his 'Now then,' with that anticipatory air, she answered
instantly--'Yes; something rather odd has been happening. I've been
seeing beyond my usual range.'

'Really!' He smiled at her with a mixture of patronage and affection.
'And did you find there was "something new under the sun" after all?'

'Well, perhaps not so new, though it seemed new to me. But something
differently looked at. Why do we pretend that all conversion is to some
religious dogma--why not to a view of life?'

'Bless my soul! I begin to feel nervous.'

'Do you remember once telling me that I had a thing that was rare in my
sex--a sense of humour?'

'I remember often thinking it,' he said handsomely.

'It wasn't the first time I'd heard that. And it was one of the
compliments I liked best.'

'We all do. It means we have a sense of proportion--the mental
suppleness that is capable of the ironic view; an eye that can look
right as well as left.'

She nodded. 'When you wrote to me once, "My dear Ironist," I--yes--I
felt rather superior. I'm conscious now that it's been a piece of
hidden, intellectual pride with me that I could smile at most things.'

'Well, do you mean to forswear pride? For you can't live without
smiling.'

'