“Yes; quite a year ago.”

Mrs. Bethune laughs her usual slow, cruel little laugh, that is always in some strange way so full of fascination.  She, too, had known Matilda Bruce.  “I am afraid poor Mr. Hastings must have had a great many refusals,” says she.  She looks at Mrs. Chichester.  “So you are going there?”

“Yes, for my sins.  Fred Hastings is a very old friend of mine.”

“What a great many old friends you have,” says Mrs. Bethune softly.

“Well, it is better to have old friends than no friends”—­making the retort courteous, with a beaming smile.

“I’ve been staying at the Hastings’, too,” says Minnie Hescott, glad to show that she is within the sacred circle, even though it be on its outermost edge.  “But——­” She stops.

“I know.  You needn’t go on,” says Mrs. Chichester.  “I’ve heard all about it.  A terrible ménage, and no fires anywhere.  Amy Stuart told me—­she was staying with them last Christmas—­that she often wished she was the roast joint in the oven, she felt so withered up with cold.”

“Well, marriage improves people,” says Colonel Neilson, laughing.  “Let us hope it will enlarge Mrs. Hastings’ mind as to the matter of fires.”

“It will!” says Mrs. Chichester.

“But why?  If——­” says Margaret, leaning forward.

“Because marriage improves women, and”—­Mrs. Chichester pauses, and lets her queer green eyes rest on Marryatt’s—­“and does the other thing for men.”

Marryatt is looking back at her as if transfixed.  He is thinking of her words rather than of her.  Has marriage disimproved her husband?  Has he been a brute to her?  He knows so little—­she has told him so little!  At this moment it occurs to him that she has told him nothing.

“What are you staring at?” asks she presently.  “Is anything the matter with me?  Have I straws in my hair?”

His answer is interrupted by Mr. Gower.

“Take it down,” says he.  “How can anyone tell nowadays what a woman has in her hair unless one sees?”

“Well, it’s not straws, any way,” says Mrs. Chichester, with a shrug of her lean shoulders.

“It might be worse!” says Mr. Gower, who has always declared that Mrs. Chichester has dyed her hair.  His tone, which is always sepulchral, attracts immediate attention, as all things sepulchral do.  “And as for Matilda Bruce, I refuse to see why you should sit upon her with such determined cruelty.  I know her, and I think her a most excellent wife, and house-wife, and—­mother!"

“A mother!” says Margaret, who had known Mrs. Bruce slightly, but had not been in sympathy with her.

“Why, yes!  She’s got a baby,” says Mrs. Chichester.  “Didn’t you hear?  Nobody does hear much about them.  For my part, I pity her about that baby!  It’s so awkward to have children!”

“Awkward?”

“Yes.  Nasty people go about asking their ages, especially the age of the eldest little horror, and then they can guess to a nicety how long one must have lived.  It’s a mean way of finding out one’s age.  I’m thankful I have no children.”