force of which Mr. Haim was the unwilling channel.  Mr. Haim, highly self-conscious, began to pour out the tea.  Mr. Prince, highly self-conscious, suggested that he should make himself useful by distributing the crumpets while they were hot.  George, highly selfconscious, accepted a crumpet.  Mr. Prince chatted; George responded in a brave worldly fashion; Mr. Haim said ‘Yes,’ ‘Ye-es,’ very absently.

And then Mrs. Haim appeared smiling in the doorway.  “Ah!” breathed everybody, assuaged.  “Ah!” Mr. Haim moved from in front of the tea-tray to the next seat.  Mrs. Haim was perhaps somewhat pale, but she gave a sincere, positive assurance that she was perfectly well again.  Reassurance spread throughout the company.  Forebodings vanished; hearts lightened; gladness reigned; the excellence of crumpets became apparent.  And all this swift, wonderful change was brought about by the simple entry of the woman.  But beneath the genuine relief and satisfaction of the men there stirred vaguely the thought of the mysteriousness of women, of the entire female sex.  Mrs. Haim, charwoman, was just as mysterious as any other woman.  As for George, despite the exhilaration which he could feel rising in him effortless and unsought, he was preoccupied by more than women’s mysteriousness; the conception of destiny lingered and faintly troubled him.  It was as though he had been walking on a clear path through a vast and empty and safe forest, and the eyes of a tiger had gleamed for an instant in the bush and gone.  Not a real tiger!  And if a real tiger, then a tiger that would never recur, and the only tiger in the forest!...  Yet the entire forest was transformed.

Mrs. Haim was wearing the blue sateen.  It was a dress unsuited to her because it emphasized her large bulk; but it was her best dress; it shone and glittered; it imposed.  Her duty was to wear it on that Sunday afternoon.  She was shy, without being self-conscious.  To preside over a society consisting of young bloods, etchers of European renown, and pillars of the architectural profession was an ordeal for her.  She did not pretend that it was not an ordeal.  She did not pretend that the occasion was not extraordinary.  She was quite natural in her calm confusion.  She was not even proud, being perhaps utterly incapable of social pride.  Her husband was proud for her.  He looked at her earnestly, wistfully.  He could not disguise his anxiety for her success.  Was she equal to the role?  She was.  Of course she was.  He had never doubted that she would be (he said to himself).  His pride increased, scarcely escaped being fatuous.

“I must congratulate you on the new front doormat, Mrs. Haim,” said Mr. Prince, with notable conversational tact.  “I felt it at once in the dark.”

Mrs. Haim smiled.

“I do like a good doormat,” she said.  “It saves so much work, I always think.  I told Mr. Haim I thought we needed a new one, and bless me if he didn’t take me straight out to buy one.”