She was not quite sure. She thought it would be when her hair was grey—or rather white. She had been informed by experts that her peculiar shade of hair went white, not grey. The child turned her head as they walked and looked at her. Joan felt herself smarting under that look, but persisted.!

He was sitting on the front seat, facing her. “I’m glad I went,” he said with sudden vehemence. “I loved watching you, moving about among all those people. I never knew before how beautiful you are.” “Oh, please don’t go,” cried Joan. “Mrs. Stopperton has just gone round to the doctor’s. She won’t be long. I’m a friend of hers.”

A short, dark, thick-set man entered and stood looking round the room. The frame must once have been powerful, but now it was shrunken and emaciated. The shabby, threadbare clothes hung loosely from the stooping shoulders. Only the head seemed to have retained its vigour. The face, from which the long black hair was brushed straight back, was ghastly white. Out of it, deep set beneath great shaggy, overhanging brows, blazed the fierce, restless eyes of a fanatic. The huge, thin-lipped mouth seemed to have petrified itself into a savage snarl. He gave Joan the idea, as he stood there glaring round him, of a hunted beast at bay. The summer was propitious. Phillips knew his London well, and how to get away from it. There were winding lanes in Hertfordshire, Surrey hills and commons, deep, cool, bird-haunted woods in Buckingham. Each week there was something to look forward to, something to plan for and manoeuvre. The sense of adventure, a spice of danger, added zest. She still knocked frequently, as before, at the door of the hideously-furnished little house in North Street; but Mrs. Phillips no longer oppressed her as some old man of the sea she could never hope to shake off from her shoulders. The flabby, foolish face, robbed of its terrors, became merely pitiful. She found herself able to be quite gentle and patient with Mrs. Phillips. Even the sloppy kisses she came to bear without a shudder down her spine. “I like the houses, too,” he said. “There’s a character about them. You don’t often find such fine drawing-rooms in London.”