As the storm drew away, the people in the hall of the hotel sat down; and with a comfortable sense of relief, began to tell each other stories about great storms, and produced in many cases their occupations for the evening.  The chess-board was brought out, and Mr. Elliot, who wore a stock instead of a collar as a sign of convalescence, but was otherwise much as usual, challenged Mr. Pepper to a final contest.  Round them gathered a group of ladies with pieces of needlework, or in default of needlework, with novels, to superintend the game, much as if they were in charge of two small boys playing marbles.  Every now and then they looked at the board and made some encouraging remark to the gentlemen.

Mrs. Paley just round the corner had her cards arranged in long ladders before her, with Susan sitting near to sympathise but not to correct, and the merchants and the miscellaneous people who had never been discovered to possess names were stretched in their arm-chairs with their newspapers on their knees.  The conversation in these circumstances was very gentle, fragmentary, and intermittent, but the room was full of the indescribable stir of life.  Every now and then the moth, which was now grey of wing and shiny of thorax, whizzed over their heads, and hit the lamps with a thud.

A young woman put down her needlework and exclaimed, “Poor creature! it would be kinder to kill it.”  But nobody seemed disposed to rouse himself in order to kill the moth.  They watched it dash from lamp to lamp, because they were comfortable, and had nothing to do.

On the sofa, beside the chess-players, Mrs. Elliot was imparting a new stitch in knitting to Mrs. Thornbury, so that their heads came very near together, and were only to be distinguished by the old lace cap which Mrs. Thornbury wore in the evening.  Mrs. Elliot was an expert at knitting, and disclaimed a compliment to that effect with evident pride.

“I suppose we’re all proud of something,” she said, “and I’m proud of my knitting.  I think things like that run in families.  We all knit well.  I had an uncle who knitted his own socks to the day of his death—­and he did it better than any of his daughters, dear old gentleman.  Now I wonder that you, Miss Allan, who use your eyes so much, don’t take up knitting in the evenings.  You’d find it such a relief, I should say—­such a rest to the eyes—­and the bazaars are so glad of things.”  Her voice dropped into the smooth half-conscious tone of the expert knitter; the words came gently one after another.  “As much as I do I can always dispose of, which is a comfort, for then I feel that I am not wasting my time—­”

Miss Allan, being thus addressed, shut her novel and observed the others placidly for a time.  At last she said, “It is surely not natural to leave your wife because she happens to be in love with you.  But that—­as far as I can make out—­is what the gentleman in my story does.”

“Tut, tut, that doesn’t sound good—­no, that doesn’t sound at all natural,” murmured the knitters in their absorbed voices.