and a Post Office Savings Bank book.... All this trouble on
account of Florrie's sheets!

Sarah Gailey was in her bedroom, and did not dare to came out of it even
to accuse Louisa of neglecting the basement tea. And Hilda continued to
stand for ages at the bedroom door, while the dusk grew deeper and
deeper. At last the front door opened, and George's step was in the
hall. Hilda recognized it with a thrill of terror, turning pale. George
ran down into the basement and stumbled. "Hello!" she heard him call
out, "what about tea? Where are you all? Sarah!" No answer, no sound in
response! He ran up the basement steps. Would he call in at the
dining-room, or would he come to the bedroom in search of her? He did
not stop at the dining-room. Hilda wanted to shut the bedroom door, but
dared not because she could not do it noiselessly. Now he was on the
first floor! She rushed to the bed, and sat on it, as she had been
sitting previously, and waited in the most painful and irrational agony.
She was astonished at the darkness of the room. Turning her head, she
saw only a whitish blur instead of a face in the dressing-table mirror.

II

"What's up?" he demanded, bursting somewhat urgently into the bedroom
with his hat on. "What price the husband coming home to his tea? No tea!
No light! I nearly broke my neck down the basement stairs."

He put his hands against her elbows and kissed her, rather clumsily,
owing to the gloom, between her nose and her mouth. She did not shrink
back, but accepted the embrace quite insensibly. The contact of his
moustache and of his lips, and his slight, pleasant masculine odour,
produced no effect on her whatever.

"Why are you sitting here? Look here, I've signed the transfer of those
Continental shares, and paid the cheque! So it's domino, now!"

Between the engagement and the marriage there had been an opportunity of
purchasing three thousand pounds' worth of preference shares in the
Brighton Hotel Continental Limited, which hotel was the latest and
largest in the King's Road, a vast affair of eight storeys and bathrooms
on every floor. The chance of such an investment had fascinated George.
It helped his dreams and pointed to the time when he would be manager
and part proprietor of a palace like the Continental. Hilda being very
willing, he had sold her railways shares and purchased the hotel shares,
and he knew that he had done a good thing. Now he possessed an interest
in three differen