thing whatever, the usual atmosphere
had reassembled itself.

From it he turned to the window, to the westering sun, to the motors,
the smart gowns and the women who looked so delightful and of whom all
had their secrets--secrets trivial, momentous, perverse or merely
horrible.

Again he turned. Lennox, who had approached, was addressing him. "You
were at the law school. I have to make a will. Will you help me?"

Serviceably Jones sprang up. "Come to my shop. It is just around the
corner."

XXIV

Among the old brocades with which the room was fitted and which,
together with the silver bed and the enamelled faience, gave it an
earlier century air, Cassy stood before a cheval-glass.

She was properly dressed. Her costume, light cloth, faintly blue, was
exquisitely embroidered. Beneath it was lingerie of the kind which, it
is said, may be drawn through a ring. Behind and between was Cassy, on
whose docked hair sat a hat that was very unbecoming and therefore
equally smart.

A moment before she had thanked and dismissed Emma. Emma was the maid.
With a slant of the eye, that said and suppressed many things, Emma had
gone.

Through the open windows came the call of birds, the smell of fresh
turf. A patch of sky was visible. It was tenderly blue. There was a
patch too of grass that showed an asparagus green.

From the mirror Cassy went to a table and, from a jade platter, took a
ring. It was made of six little hoops each set with small stones. She
put it on. The platter held other rings. There was a sapphire,
inch-long, deep and dark. She put that on. There was also an Australian
opal and an Asian emerald, the latter greener than the grass. She put
these on. Together with the wedding-ring they made quite a show. Too
much of a show, she thought.

Like the costume, the hat, like other costumes, more hats and box after
box of lingerie, they had all surprisingly dumped themselves, there, at
her feet, the day after the wedding. The bundle, which she had brought
with her, she had found very useless and so awkward that she would have
given it to Emma, had it not seemed unsuited to a young person
manifestly so fine. Since then it had been tucked away in a cupboard,
safely out of sight.

That was just five days ago, a brief eternity, during which life seemed
to be driving her headlong to some unimagined goal. Until the evening
previous she had had barely a moment. But on that evening, Paliser, who
was dining at