* * * * *

They went to Louvain a few days later and Vivie’s newly awakened senses for the beautiful in art revelled in the glorious architecture, so much of which was afterwards wrecked in the War.

Walking beneath the planes in a narrow street between monastic buildings, they descried a gaunt, stately figure of a Father Superior of some great Order.  “There!” said Mrs. Warren; “that’s him, that’s your father.”  They quickened their pace and were presently alongside him.  He flashed his great, grey eagle eyes for a contemptuous second on the face of Mrs. Warren, who was all of a tremble and could not meet the gaze.  Vivie, he scarcely glanced at as he strode towards a doorway which engulfed him, though the eyes she had inherited would have met his unflinchingly.

* * * * *

David Williams duly visited Antwerp, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Berlin, Vienna, and Buda-Pest.  Much of what he saw disgusted, even revolted, him, but he found few of his fellow-countrywomen held captive and crying to be delivered from a life of infamy.  On his return to England in the autumn of 1909, he published the results of his observations; but they had very little effect on continental public opinion.

However Mrs. Warren in due course turned her two establishments into hotels that gradually acquired a well-founded character of propriety and were in time included amongst those recommended to quiet, studious people by first class tourist agencies.  Their names were changed respectively from Hotel Leopold II to Hotel Edouard-Sept, from The Homestead, Roquebrune, to Hotel du Royaume-Uni.  Mrs. Warren or Mme. Varennes retired completely from the management, but arranged to retain for her own use the magnificently furnished appartement on the first floor of the Hotel Edouard-Sept at Brussels, where Vivie had seen her in the late spring of 1909.  She still continued to receive a certain income from these two admirably managed hostelries.

Constrained by Vivie she bestowed large donations on charitable and educational institutions affecting the welfare of women and established a fund of Ten thousand pounds for the promotion of Woman Suffrage in Great Britain, which fund was to be at Vivie’s disposal.  But even with these sacrifices to bienseance she remained a lady of considerable fortune.

She resisted however all invitations to make her home in England.  “No, dear; I’ve got used to foreign ways.  I hate my own people; they’re such damned hypocrites; and the cooking don’t suit my taste, accustomed to the best.”

But she gave up brandy except as a very occasional chasse after the postprandial coffee.  She no longer dyed her hair and used very little rouge and no scent but lavender.  Her hair turned a warm white colour, and dressed a la Pompadour made her look what she probably was at heart—­quite a decent sort.