She turned to him after a while inquiringly, finding something of unwonted gravity in his manner.

“Did you get the box?” she asked.

“The box?” he repeated blankly.  Then, pulling himself up, “No,” he said quickly, “I forgot all about it.  The fact is, I heard something this afternoon which put it out of my head.  I am afraid,” he went on, with a growing hesitation, “you will be rather shocked.”

“Ah,” she cried quickly, catching at her breath, “something has happened.  Tell me.  Don’t preface it; I can bear anything if you will only tell me straight out.”

“It’s Rainham,” he murmured.  “He died last night at Blackpool.  I heard it from McAllister, at the club.”

He looked away from her vaguely out of his window at the pale streets, where a few lamps were beginning to appear, waiting in a fever of apprehension, which he vainly sought to justify, for some word or comment on the part of his wife.

As none came, and the silence grew intolerable, he ventured at last to glance furtively across at her.  Her face seemed to him a shade paler than before, but that might be exaggerated by the relief of her rich and sombre furs.  Her eyes were quite expressionless and blank, although she had the air of being immensely thoughtful; her mouth was inscrutable and unmoved.  And he experienced a sudden pang of horror at the anticipation of a dinner alone with her, with the ghostly presence of this news dividing them, before he reminded himself that Colonel Lightmark was to be of the party.

For, perhaps, the first time in his life the prospect of his uncle’s company afforded him a sensation of relief.

CHAPTER XXXI

When Oswyn emerged from the narrow doorway of the gallery in Bond Street, which on the morrow was to be filled with the heterogeneous presence of those who, for different reasons, are honoured with cards of invitation to private views, it was still daylight, although the lamps had been lighted; and the east wind, which during the earlier hours of the day had made the young summer seem such a mockery of flowery illusions, had taken a more genial air from the south into alliance; and there was something at once caressing and exhilarating in their united touch as they wandered in gentle eddies up the crooked thoroughfare.

Oswyn paused upon the pavement, outside the showroom which Mosenthal called a gallery, gazing up the road towards Oxford Street, with a momentary appreciation of the subtile early evening charm, which lent so real a beauty even to a vista of commonplace shop-fronts and chimney-pots, straightening his bent figure, and wondering whither to betake himself.

He had not allowed his friend’s death to be an excuse for abandoning the projected exhibition; indeed, when this event occurred, he was already too far compromised; and he even found the labour involved in the preparations for the new departure a very welcome distraction—­the one thing which made it possible for the desolate man to stay on in London, which, he assured himself dogmatically, was the only place on earth where he could face life with an indifference which was at least a tolerable imitation of equanimity.