“No, we won’t stay long, Mr. Bricknell,” she said gravely.

“Good night, Dad,” said Jim, as his father left the room.

Josephine went to the window.  She had rather a stiff, poupee walk.

“How is the night?” she said, as if to change the whole feeling in the room.  She pushed back the thick grey-silk curtains.  “Why?” she exclaimed.  “What is that light burning?  A red light?”

“Oh, that’s only the pit-bank on fire,” said Robert, who had followed her.

“How strange!—­Why is it burning now?”

“It always burns, unfortunately—­it is most consistent at it.  It is the refuse from the mines.  It has been burning for years, in spite of all efforts to the contrary.”

“How very curious!  May we look at it?” Josephine now turned the handle of the French windows, and stepped out.

“Beautiful!” they heard her voice exclaim from outside.

In the room, Julia laid her hand gently, protectively over the hand of Cyril Scott.

“Josephine and Robert are admiring the night together!” she said, smiling with subtle tenderness to him.

“Naturally!  Young people always do these romantic things,” replied Cyril Scott.  He was twenty-two years old, so he could afford to be cynical.

“Do they?—­Don’t you think it’s nice of them?” she said, gently removing her hand from his.  His eyes were shining with pleasure.

“I do.  I envy them enormously.  One only needs to be sufficiently naive,” he said.

“One does, doesn’t one!” cooed Julia.

“I say, do you hear the bells?” said Robert, poking his head into the room.

“No, dear!  Do you?” replied Julia.

“Bells!  Hear the bells!  Bells!” exclaimed the half-tipsy and self-conscious Jim.  And he rolled in his chair in an explosion of sudden, silent laughter, showing his mouthful of pointed teeth, like a dog.  Then he gradually gathered himself together, found his feet, smiling fixedly.

“Pretty cool night!” he said aloud, when he felt the air on his almost bald head.  The darkness smelt of sulphur.

Josephine and Robert had moved out of sight.  Julia was abstracted, following them with her eyes.  With almost supernatural keenness she seemed to catch their voices from the distance.

“Yes, Josephine, wouldn’t that be awfully romantic!”—­she suddenly called shrilly.

The pair in the distance started.

“What—!” they heard Josephine’s sharp exclamation.

“What’s that?—­What would be romantic?” said Jim as he lurched up and caught hold of Cyril Scott’s arm.

“Josephine wants to make a great illumination of the grounds of the estate,” said Julia, magniloquent.

“No—­no—­I didn’t say it,” remonstrated Josephine.

“What Josephine said,” explained Robert, “was simply that it would be pretty to put candles on one of the growing trees, instead of having a Christmas-tree indoors.”