Chapter 11 Summary

Geoffrey is missing at the next performance. O'Hara is discreetly attentive to Stella, who seems focused on other things. He notices that she's wearing a new string of cheap pearls, perhaps to impress him. George suggests to O'Hara that someone should keep a caring eye on Geoffrey.

O'Hara offers Stella a ride home after the show, but she says she'll walk. He's deeply disappointed, but he is soon surprised by her knock on his basement window. As she warms herself by the gas fire, O'Hara wonders why she doesn't wear the coat Lily gave her. It has a fur collar and, Stella explains, draws too much attention. It is best, she goes on, to "encase cheap goods in brown paper." O'Hara is stunned. He asks about her new pearls, and Stella says they were a gift from her mother, who left them on...