“Will you serve me and fight for me against all my enemies?” she asked. “But wasn’t that the Lord’s idea,” he said; “when He gave Eve to Adam to be his helpmeet?”!

“I’ve always been considered good at asking awkward questions,” she assured him. He saw her “home”; and went on up the stairs to his own floor.

He lapsed into silence: his almost transparent hands stretched out towards the fire. “I always come prepared to these scrimmages,” she explained. “I’ve got some Hazeline in my bag. They haven’t kicked you, have they?” Joan had difficulty in deciding on her own frock. Her four evening dresses, as she walked round them, spread out upon the bed, all looked too imposing, for what Mrs. Phillips had warned her would be a “homely affair.” She had one other, a greyish-fawn, with sleeves to the elbow, that she had had made expressly for public dinners and political At Homes. But that would be going to the opposite extreme, and might seem discourteous—to her hostess. Besides, “mousey” colours didn’t really suit her. They gave her a curious sense of being affected. In the end she decided to risk a black crêpe-de-chine, square cut, with a girdle of gold embroidery. There couldn’t be anything quieter than black, and the gold embroidery was of the simplest. She would wear it without any jewellery whatever: except just a star in her hair. The result, as she viewed the effect in the long glass, quite satisfied her. Perhaps the jewelled star did scintillate rather. It had belonged to her mother. But her hair was so full of shadows: it wanted something to relieve it. Also she approved the curved line of her bare arms. It was certainly very beautiful, a woman’s arm. She took her gloves in her hand and went down.