clear gaze, which apparently referred
to her hair, for she now remarked in just the tone she had used for the
news about Neale, "That way of arranging your coiffure _is_ singularly
becoming to you. Mr. Marsh was speaking about it the other day, but I
hadn't specially noticed it. He's right. It gives you that swathed
close-coifed Leonardo da Vinci look." She put her handkerchief into a
small bag of mauve linen, embroidered with white and pale-green crewels,
and took up her parasol.

Marise felt something menacing in the air. Eugenia frightened her a
little with that glass-smooth look of hers. The best thing to do was to
let her go without another word. And yet she heard her voice asking,
urgently, peremptorily, "What was the name of the man from New
Hampshire?"

Eugenia said, "What man from New Hampshire?" and then, under Marise's
silent gaze, corrected herself and changed her tone. "Oh yes, let me
see: Neale introduced him, of course. Why, some not uncommon name, and
yet not like Smith or Jones. It began with an L, I believe."

Marise said to herself, "I will not say another word about this," and
aloud she said roughly, brusquely, "It wasn't Lowder, of course."

"Yes, yes," said Eugenia, "you're right. It was Lowder. I _thought_ it
was probably something you'd know about. Neale always tells you
everything."

She looked away and remarked, "I suppose you will inherit the furniture
of this house? There are nice bits. This Windsor chair; and I thought I
saw a Chippendale buffet in the dining-room."

Marise, immobile in her chair, repeated, "It wasn't Lowder. You didn't
say it was Lowder."

"Yes, it was Lowder," said Eugenia clearly. "And now you speak of it
once more, I remember one more thing about their talk although I didn't
try to understand much of it. It was all connected with the Powers
family. It was their woodlot which this Mr. Lowder had bought for Neale.
I was surprised to know that they had ever had any wood-land. They have
always seemed too sordidly poverty-stricken. But it seems this was the
only way Neale could get hold of it, because they refused to sell
otherwise."

She looked again at Marise, a long, steady, and entirely opaque gaze
which Marise returned mutely, incapable of uttering a word. She had the
feeling of leaning with all her weight against an inner-door that must
be kept shut.

"Did Neale _tell_ you this man had secured the Powers woodlot for him,
for Neale, for our mill?" she heard