re seldom abandoning Irene's face and figure. As he was
obliged to confess to himself, he got no change out of her--she was cool
enough, as cool as her shoulders looked under their veil of creamy lace.
He expected to have caught her out in some little game with Bosinney;
but not a bit of it, she kept up her end remarkably well. As for that
architect chap, he was as glum as a bear with a sore head--Winifred
could barely get a word out of him; he ate nothing, but he certainly
took his liquor, and his face kept getting whiter, and his eyes looked
queer.

It was all very amusing.

For Dartie himself was in capital form, and talked freely, with a
certain poignancy, being no fool. He told two or three stories verging
on the improper, a concession to the company, for his stories were not
used to verging. He proposed Irene's health in a mock speech. Nobody
drank it, and Winifred said: "Don't be such a clown, Monty!"

At her suggestion they went after dinner to the public terrace
overlooking the river.

"I should like to see the common people making love," she said, "it's
such fun!"

There were numbers of them walking in the cool, after the day's heat,
and the air was alive with the sound of voices, coarse and loud, or soft
as though murmuring secrets.

It was not long before Winifred's better sense--she was the only Forsyte
present--secured them an empty bench. They sat down in a row. A heavy
tree spread a thick canopy above their heads, and the haze darkened
slowly over the river.

Dartie sat at the end, next to him Irene, then Bosinney, then Winifred.
There was hardly room for four, and the man of the world could feel
Irene's arm crushed against his own; he knew that she could not withdraw
it without seeming rude, and this amused him; he devised every now and
again a movement that would bring her closer still. He thought: 'That
Buccaneer Johnny shan't have it all to himself! It's a pretty tight fit,
certainly!'

From far down below on the dark river came drifting the tinkle of a
mandoline, and voices singing the old round:

'A boat, a boat, unto the ferry, For we'll go over and be merry; And
laugh, and quaff, and drink brown sherry!'

And suddenly the moon appeared, young and tender, floating up on her
back from behind a tree; and as though she had breathed, the air was
cooler, but down that cooler air came always the warm odour of the
limes.

Over his cigar Dartie peered round at Bosinney, who was sitting with