nice there."

"Oh!" said Val, "so he's beginning to see a joke again."

"He's bought some land and sent for his mother."

"What on earth will she do out there?"

"All she cares about is Jon. Do you still think it a happy release?"

Val's shrewd eyes narrowed to grey pin-points between their dark lashes.

"Fleur wouldn't have suited him a bit. She's not bred right."

"Poor little Fleur!" sighed Holly. Ah! it was strange--this marriage!
The young man, Mont, had caught her on the rebound, of course, in the
reckless mood of one whose ship has just gone down. Such a plunge could
not but be--as Val put it--an outside chance. There was little to be
told from the back view of her young cousin's veil, and Holly's eyes
reviewed the general aspect of this Christian wedding. She who had made
a love-match which had been successful, had a horror of unhappy
marriages. This might not be one in the end--but it was clearly a
toss-up; and to consecrate a toss-up in this fashion with manufactured
unction before a crowd of fashionable free-thinkers--for who thought
otherwise than freely, or not at all, when they were 'dolled'
up--seemed to her as near a sin as one could find in an age which had
abolished them. Her eyes wandered from the prelate in his robes (a
Charwell--the Forsytes had not as yet produced a prelate) to Val,
beside her, thinking--she was certain of--the Mayfly filly at fifteen
to one for the Cambridgeshire. They passed on and caught the profile of
the ninth baronet, in counterfeitment of the kneeling process. She
could just see the neat ruck above his knees where he had pulled his
trousers up, and thought: 'Val's forgotten to pull up his!' Her eyes
passed to the pew in front of her, where Winifred's substantial form
was gowned with passion, and on again to Soames and Annette kneeling
side by side. A little smile came on her lips--Prosper Profond, back
from the South Seas of the Channel, would be kneeling too, about six
rows behind. Yes! This was a funny "small" business, however it turned
out; still it was in a proper church and would be in the proper papers
to-morrow morning.

They had begun a hymn; she could hear the ninth baronet across the
aisle, singing of the hosts of Midian. Her little finger touched Val's
thumb--they were holding the same hymn-book--and a tiny thrill passed
through her, preserved from twenty years ago. He stooped and whispered:

"I say, d'you remember the rat?" The rat at their wedding in