‘Have you?’ he questioned.

She nodded.  For a fraction of an instant she thought of her husband, stolid with all his impulsiveness, over at David Dain’s.

‘People say to me, “Why don’t you get married?"’ Twemlow went on, drawn by the subtle invitation of her manner.  ’But how can I get married?  I can’t get married by taking thought.  They make me tired.  I ask them sometimes whether they imagine I keep single for the fun of the thing....  Do you know that I’ve never yet been in love—­no, not the least bit.’

He presented her with this fact as with a jewel, and she so accepted it.

‘What a pity!’ she said, gently.

‘Yes, it’s a pity,’ he admitted.  ’But look here.  That’s the worst of me.  When I get talking about myself I’m likely to become a bore.’

Offering him the cigarette cabinet she breathed the old, effective, sincere answer:  ‘Not at all, it’s very interesting.’

‘Let me see, this house belongs to you, doesn’t it?’ he said in a different casual tone as he lighted a cigarette.

Shortly afterwards he departed.  John had not returned from Dain’s, but Twemlow said that he could not possibly stay, as he had an appointment at Hanbridge.  He shook hands with restrained ardour.  Her last words to him were:  ‘I’m so sorry my husband isn’t back,’ and even these ordinary words struck him as a beautiful phrase.  Alone in the drawing-room, she sighed happily and examined herself in the large glass over the mantelpiece.  The shaded lights left her loveliness unimpaired; and yet, as she gazed at the mirror, the worm gnawing at the root of her happiness was not her husband’s precarious situation, nor his deviousness, nor even his mere existence, but the one thought:  ’Oh!  That I were young again!’

* * * * *

‘Mother, whatever do you think?’ cried Millicent, running in eagerly in advance of Ethel at ten o’clock.  ’Lucy Turner’s sister died to-day, and so she can’t sing in the opera, and I am to have her part if I can learn it in three weeks.’

‘What is her part?’ Leonora asked, as though waking up.

‘Why, mother, you know!  Patience, of course!  Isn’t it splendid?’

’Where are father and Mr. Twemlow?  Ethel inquired, falling into a chair.

CHAPTER V

THE CHANCE

Leonora was aware that she had tamed one of the lions which menaced her husband’s path; she could not conceive that Arthur Twemlow, whatever his mysterious power over John, would find himself able to exercise it now; Twemlow was a friend of hers, and so disarmed.  She wished to say proudly to John:  ’I neither know nor wish to know the nature of the situation between you and Arthur Twemlow.  But be at ease.  He is no longer dangerous.  I have arranged it.’  The thing was impossible to be said; she was bound to leave John in ignorance; she might not even hint.