arked cheerfully as
they went up in the lift, and, a few moments later, when he met Mrs.
Kelly Jimmy saw that her husband was speaking the truth.

Dora Kelly was a pretty, thrifty little woman, with a mass of rather
untidy fair hair. She was still in the tea-gown which, apparently, she
had been wearing all the day, whilst her foot-gear consisted of a pair
of Japanese slippers; and yet the whole effect was charming, possibly
because she was entirely unaffected and obviously happy. The flat
reflected the character of its mistress. It was full of good things, all
in wonderful disarray. Even the drawing-room had an air of having
undergone a strenuous straightening up a month previously, since which
event it had not been touched again.

"Dinner won't be long, Douglas," Mrs. Kelly said. "But the cook went out
at four o'clock and hasn't come in yet; I'm afraid she must have got
drunk again; so I borrowed the Harmers' servant," she turned to Jimmy.
"Servants are such a nuisance, Mr. Grierson, yet one daren't discharge
them, and our cook is a treasure when she's sober. Douglas says you live
in lodgings in some suburb, so you don't have those worries, I suppose.
Here it's dreadful." She shook her head dolefully; but a moment later
she was smiling again and chattering gaily about her own experiences in
lodgings. She had been on the Press herself prior to her marriage, and
she knew, only too well, the ways of the London landlady.

If he had not chanced to saunter up Oxford Street that afternoon Jimmy
would have enjoyed immensely his dinner and the long talk which followed
it. He had been craving for the society of his own kind; yet now he had
got it it did not seem such a very great thing after all; for Lalage
Penrose had come into his life, and the thought of her was uppermost in
his mind. Even whilst he was talking over old times with Kelly, or
listening to Dora Kelly's laughing descriptions of the struggles of
their early married life, he was wondering how Lalage was spending the
evening, and the thought was making him sick at heart. Mentally, he
cursed himself for a fool, and tried hard to put the memory away from
him; but it was an effort all the time; and when Kelly finally allowed
him to go to bed, long after midnight, he shut his door with a sigh of
relief. But he did not undress. Instead, he sat in a big armchair,
staring into the fire, which, having been lighted by the borrowed
servant just before she left, a full three