e was jewellery too, worth a couple of hundred
pounds, perhaps, and lace, and furs. The jewellery might come in handy;
it could be 'gopherised.' The furniture wasn't bad either.

Of course she must go on with the house. It was no great responsibility,
being held on a yearly agreement. Victoria then looked through her
accounts; they did not amount to much, for Barbezan Soeurs, though
willing to assist in extracting money by means of bogus invoices, made
it a rule to demand cash for genuine purchases. Twenty pounds would
cover all the small accounts. The rent was all right, as it would not be
due until the end of September. The rates were all right too, being
payable every half year; they could be ignored until the blue notice
came, just before Christmas.

Victoria felt considerably strengthened by this investigation. At a
pinch she could live a year on the present footing, during which
something must turn up. She tried to consider for a moment the various
things that might turn up. None occurred to her. She settled the
difficulty by going upstairs again to dress. When she rang for Mary to
do her hair, the girl was surprised to find her mistress perfectly cool.
Without a word, however, Mary restored her hair to order. It was a
beautiful and elegant woman, perhaps a trifle pale and open mouthed,
who, some minutes later, set out to walk to Regent's Park.

Victoria sat back in her chair. Peace was upon her soul. Perhaps she had
just passed through a crisis, perhaps she was entering upon one, but
what did it matter? The warmth of July was in the clear air, the canal
slowly carried past her its film of dust. No sound broke through the
morning save the cries of little boys fishing for invisible fishes, and,
occasionally, a raucous roar from some prisoner in the Zoo. Now that she
had received the blow and was recovering she was conscious of a curious
feeling of lightness; she felt freer than the day before. Then she was a
man's property, tied to him by the bond of interest; now she was able to
do what she chose, know whom she chose, so long as that money lasted.
Ah, it would be good one day when she had enough money to be able to
look the future in the face and flaunt in its forbidding countenance the
fact that she was free, for ever free.

Victoria was no longer a dreamer; she was a woman of action. The natural
sequence of her thoughts brought her up at once against the means to the
triumphant end. Three hundred and fifty po