The room was full of the bubble and the squeak of conversation.  Nobody could hear anything that anybody said; which seemed of little consequence, since no one waited for anything so slow as an answer.  Modern conversation seemed to Winifred so different from the days of her prime, when a drawl was all the vogue.  Still it was “amusing,” which, of course, was all that mattered.  Even the Forsytes were talking with extreme rapidity—­Fleur and Christopher, and Imogen, and young Nicholas’s youngest, Patrick.  Soames, of course, was silent; but George, by the spinet, kept up a running commentary, and Francie, by her mantel-shelf.  Winifred drew nearer to the ninth baronet.  He seemed to promise a certain repose; his nose was fine and drooped a little, his grey moustaches too; and she said, drawling through her smile: 

“It’s rather nice, isn’t it?”

His reply shot out of his smile like a snipped bread pellet

“D’you remember, in Frazer, the tribe that buries the bride up to the waist?”

He spoke as fast as anybody!  He had dark lively little eyes, too, all crinkled round like a Catholic priest’s.  Winifred felt suddenly he might say things she would regret.

“They’re always so amusing—­weddings,” she murmured, and moved on to Soames.  He was curiously still, and Winifred saw at once what was dictating his immobility.  To his right was George Forsyte, to his left Annette and Prosper Profond.  He could not move without either seeing those two together, or the reflection of them in George Forsyte’s japing eyes.  He was quite right not to be taking notice.

“They say Timothy’s sinking;” he said glumly.

“Where will you put him, Soames?”

“Highgate.”  He counted on his fingers.  “It’ll make twelve of them there, including wives.  How do you think Fleur looks?”

“Remarkably well.”

Soames nodded.  He had never seen her look prettier, yet he could not rid himself of the impression that this business was unnatural—­remembering still that crushed figure burrowing into the corner of the sofa.  From that night to this day he had received from her no confidences.  He knew from his chauffeur that she had made one more attempt on Robin Hill and drawn blank—­an empty house, no one at home.  He knew that she had received a letter, but not what was in it, except that it had made her hide herself and cry.  He had remarked that she looked at him sometimes when she thought he wasn’t noticing, as if she were wondering still what he had done—­forsooth—­to make those people hate him so.  Well, there it was!  Annette had come back, and things had worn on through the summer—­very miserable, till suddenly Fleur had said she was going to marry young Mont.  She had shown him a little more affection when she told him that.  And he had yielded—­what was the good of opposing it?  God knew that he had never wished to thwart her in anything!  And the young man seemed quite delirious about her.