staste,
until distaste shall have a semblance of reason, in the period of the
mind's awakening to revolt! Nataly shrank from the name of dolomite,
detested the name, though the scenes regained their beauty or something
of it beneath her showery vision. Every time Victor spoke of dolomites
on the journey homeward, she had at heart an accusation of her
cowardice, her duplicity, frailty, treachery to the highest of her
worship and sole support of her endurance in the world: not much blaming
him: but the degrading view of herself sank them both. On a shifty soil,
down goes the idol. For him she could plead still, for herself she could
not.

The smell of the Channel brine inspirited her sufficiently to cast off
the fit and make it seem, in the main, a bodily depression; owing to
causes, of which she was beginning to have an apprehensive knowledge:
and they were not so fearful to her as the gloom they displaced.

CHAPTER XXV. NATALY IN ACTION

A ticket of herald newspapers told the world of Victor's returning to
his London. Pretty Mrs. Blathenoy was Nataly's first afternoon visitor,
and was graciously received; no sign of inquiry for the cause of the
lady's alacrity to greet her being shown. Colney Durance came in,
bringing the rumour of an Australian cantatrice to kindle Europe; Mr.
Peridon, a seeker of tidings from the city of Bourges; Miss Priscilla
Graves, reporting of Skepsey, in a holiday Sunday tone, that his
alcoholic partner might at any moment release him; Mr. Septimus Barmby,
with a hanged heavy look, suggestive of a wharfside crane swinging the
ponderous thing he had to say. 'I have seen Miss Radnor.'

'She was well?' the mother asked, and the grand basso pitched forth an
affirmative.

'Dear sweet girl she is!' Mrs. Blathenoy exclaimed to Colney.

He bowed. 'Very sweet. And can let fly on you, like a haggis, for a
scratch.'

She laughed, glad of an escape from the conversational formalities
imposed on her by this Mrs. Victor Radnor's mighty manner. 'But what
girl worth anything!...

We all can do that, I hope, for a scratch!'

Mr. Barmby's Profession dissented.

Mr. Catkin appeared; ten minutes after his Peridon. He had met Victor
near the Exchange, and had left him humming the non fu sogno of ERNANI.

'Ah, when Victor takes to Verdi, it's a flat City, and wants a burst of
drum and brass,' Colney said; and he hummed a few bars of the march in
Attila, and shrugged. He and Victor had once admired