vent me from going to England."

"Except your own feelings about things."

"One gets over feelings with the help of Time. I'm not such a sensitive
fool as I used to be. Life has knocked all that sort of rot out of me."

She sat down at the writing-table from which Jimmy's photograph had
vanished.

"Read your letters, or read a book," she said.

And she picked up a pen.

She did not look at him again, and she tried hard to detach her mind
from him. She took a sheet of writing-paper, and began to write to
Jimmy, but she was painfully aware of Dion's presence in the room, of
every slightest movement that he made. She heard him sit down and move
something on a table, then sigh; complete silence followed. She felt as
if her whole body were flushing with irritation. Why didn't he get his
letters? She was positive Beatrice had written to tell him that Rosamund
had left the Sisterhood, and she was longing to know what effect that
news would have upon him.

Presently he moved again and got up, and she heard him go over to the
window. She strove, with a bitter effort, to concentrate her thoughts on
Jimmy, but now the Bedouin came between her and the paper; she saw him
striding indifferently through the blaze of sunshine.

"About the summer holidays this year--I am not quite sure yet what my
plans will be----" she wrote slowly.

Dion was moving again. He came away from the window, crossed the room
behind her, and opened the door. He was going to fetch his letters. She
wrote hurriedly on. He went out into the little hall and returned.

"I'm going to have a look at my letters," he said, behind her.

She glanced round.

"What did you say? Oh--your letters."

"They look pretty old," he said, turning them over.

She saw Beatrice's handwriting.

"Here's one from Beatrice Daventry," he added, in a hard voice.

"Does she often write to you?"

"She hasn't written for a long time."

He thrust a finger under the envelope. Mrs. Clarke turned and again bent
over her letter to Jimmy.

* * * * *

"Dinner is ready, Madame!"

Mrs. Clarke looked up from the writing-table at Sonia standing squarely
in the doorway, then at the clock.

"Dinner! But it's only a quarter-past seven."

"I thought you ordered it for a quarter-past seven, Madame," replied
Sonia, with quiet firmness.

"Oh, did I? I'd forgotten."

She pushed away the writing-paper and got up.

"D'you mind dining so early?" she asked Dion, looking at him for t