those fine emotional eyes, and that flutteringness of the pigeon, and an ever-changing charm of gesture.  Vera had become the best-dressed woman in Bursley.  And that is saying something.  Her husband was wealthy, with an increasing income, though, of course, as an earthenware manufacturer, and the son and grandson of an earthenware manufacturer, he joined heartily in the general Five Towns lamentation that there was no longer any money to be made out of ‘pots’.  He liked to have a well-dressed woman about the house, and he allowed her an incredible allowance, the amount of which was breathed with awe among Vera’s friends; a hundred a year, in fact.  He paid it to her quarterly, by cheque.  Such was his method.

Now a ball was to be given by the members of the Ladies’ Hockey Club (or such of them as had not been maimed for life in the pursuit of this noble pastime) on the very night after the conversation about murder.  Vera belonged to the Hockey Club (in a purely ornamental sense), and she had procured a frock for the ball which was calculated to crown her reputation as a mirror of elegance.  The skirt had—­but no (see the columns of the Staffordshire Signal for the 9th November, 1901).  The mischief was that the gown lacked, for its final perfection, one particular thing, and that particular thing was separated from Vera by the glass front of Brunt’s celebrated shop at Hanbridge.  Vera could have managed without it.  The gown would still have been brilliant without it.  But Vera had seen it, and she wanted it.

Its cost was a guinea.  Well, you will say, what is a guinea to a dainty creature with a hundred a year?  Let her go and buy the article.  The point is that she couldn’t, because she had only six and sevenpence left in the wide world. (And six weeks to Christmas!) She had squandered—­oh, soul above money!—­twenty-five pounds, and more than twenty-five pounds, since the 29th of September.  Well, you will say, credit, in other words, tick?  No, no, no!  The giant Stephen absolutely and utterly forbade her to procure anything whatever on credit.  She was afraid of him.  She knew just how far she could go with Stephen.  He was great and terrible.  Well, you will say, why couldn’t she blandish and cajole Stephen for a sovereign or so?  Impossible!  She had a hundred a year on the clear understanding that it was never exceeded nor anticipated.  Well, you will discreetly hint, there are certain devices known to housewives....  Hush!  Vera had already employed them.  Six and sevenpence was not merely all that remained to her of her dress allowance; it was all that remained to her of her household allowance till the next Monday.

Hence her nerves.

There that poor unfortunate woman lay, with her unconscious tyrant of a husband snoring beside her, desolately wakeful under the night-light in the large, luxurious bedroom—­three servants sleeping overhead, champagne in the cellar, furs in the wardrobe, valuable lace round her neck at that very instant, grand piano in the drawing-room, horses in the stable, stuffed bear in the hall—­ and her life was made a blank for want of fourteen and fivepence!  And she had nobody to confide in.  How true it is that the human soul is solitary, that content is the only true riches, and that to be happy we must be good!