‘Oh, I don’t know so much about that,’ said Chandler, now abandoning the consciously sinister, masculine tones of Bosola, and returning to his more familiar chorus-boy drawl. ‘I’m not always adored as much as you might think from looking at me. I don’t quite know why that is.’

He put his head on one side, forefinger against cheek, transforming himself to some character of ballet, perhaps the Faun from L’Après-midi.

‘You are adored by me,’ said Matilda, kissing him twice before throwing down the hairbrush on the dressing-table. ‘But I really must put a few clothes on.’

Chandler broke away from her, executing a series of little leaps in the air, although there was not much room for these entrechats. He whizzed round several times, collapsing at last upon his stool.

‘Bravo, bravo,’ said Matilda, clapping her hands. ‘You will rival Nijinsky yet, Norman, my sweetie.’

‘Be careful,’ said Chandler. ‘Your boy friend will be jealous. I can see him working himself up. He can be very violent when roused.’

Moreland had watched this display of high spirits with enjoyment, except when talk had been of other men taking out Matilda, when his face had clouded. Chandler had probably noticed that. So far from being jealous of Chandler, which would certainly have been absurd in the circumstances, Moreland seemed to welcome these antics as relaxing tension between himself and Matilda. He became more composed in manner. Paradoxically enough, something happened a moment later which paid an obvious tribute to Chandler’s status as a ladies’ man, however little regarded in that role by Moreland and the world at large.

‘I will be very quick now,’ said Matilda, ‘and then we will go. I am dying for a bite.’

She retired behind a small screen calculated to heighten rather than diminish the dramatic effect of her toilet, since her long angular body was scarcely at all concealed, and, in any case, she continually reappeared on the floor of the room to rescue garments belonging to her which lay about there. The scene was a little like those depicted in French eighteenth-century engravings where propriety is archly threatened in the presence of an amorous abbé or two-powdered hair would have suited Matilda, I thought; Moreland, perhaps, too. However, the picture’s static form was interrupted by the sound of some commotion in the passage which caused Chandler to stroll across the room and stand by the half-open door. Some people were passing who must have recognised him, because he suddenly said: ‘Why, hullo, Mrs Foxe,’ in a tone rather different from that used by him a moment before; a friendly tone, but one at the same time faintly deferential, possibly even a shade embarrassed. There was the sudden suggestion that Chandler was on his best behaviour.

‘We were looking for you,’ said a woman’s voice, speaking almost appealingly, yet still with a note of command in it. ‘We thought you would not mind if we came behind the scenes to see you. Such an adventure for us, you know. In fact we even wondered if there was any chance of persuading you to come to supper with us.’

The people in the passage could not be seen, but this was undoubtedly Stringham’s mother. She introduced Chandler to the persons with her, but the names were inaudible.

‘It would be so nice if you could come,’ she said, quite humbly now. ‘Your performance was wonderful. We adored it.’

Chandler had left the dressing-room now and was some way up the passage, but his voice could still be heard.

‘It is terribly sweet of you, Mrs Foxe,’ he said, with some hesitation. ‘It would have been quite lovely. But as a matter of fact I was supposed to be meeting an old friend this evening.’

He seemed undecided whether or not to accept the invitation, to have lost suddenly all the animation he had been showing in the dressing-room a minute or two before. Moreland and Matilda had stopped talking and had also begun to listen, evidently with great enjoyment, to what was taking place outside.

‘Oh, but if he is an old friend,’ said Mrs Foxe, who seemed to make no doubt whatever of the sex of Chandler’s companion for dinner, ‘surely he might join us too. It would be so nice. What is his name?’

Although she was almost begging Chandler to accept her invitation, there was also in her voice the imperious note of the beauty of her younger days, the rich woman, well known in the world and used to being obeyed.

‘Max Pilgrim.’

Chandler’s voice, no less than Mrs Foxe’s, suggested conflicting undertones of feeling: gratification at being so keenly desired as a guest; deference, in spite of himself, for the air of luxury and high living that Mrs Foxe bestowed about her; determination not to be jockeyed out of either his gaminerie or accustomed manner of ordering his own life by Mrs Foxe or anyone else.

‘Not the Max Pilgrim?’

‘He is at the Café de Madrid now. He sings there.’

‘But, of course. “I want to dazzle Lady Sybil…” What a funny song that one is. Does he mean it to be about Sybil Huntercombe, do you think? It is so like her. We must certainly have Mr Pilgrim too. But will he come? He has probably planned something much more amusing. Oh, I do hope he will.’

‘I think-’

‘But how wonderful, if he would. Certainly you must ask him. Do telephone to him at once and beg him to join us.’

The exact words of Chandler’s reply could not be heard, but there could be little doubt that he had been persuaded. Perhaps he was afraid of Max Pilgrim’s annoyance if the supper party had been refused on behalf of both of them. In dealing with Mrs Foxe, Chandler seemed deprived, if only temporarily, of some of his effervescence of spirit. It looked as if he might be made her prisoner. This was an unguessed aspect of Mrs Foxe’s life, a new departure in her career of domination. The party moved off, bearing Chandler with them; their voices died away as they reached the end of the passage. Moreland and Matilda continued to laugh. I asked what it was all about.

‘Norman’s grand lady,’ said Matilda. ‘She is someone called Mrs Foxe. Very smart. She sits on all sorts of committees and she met Norman a week or two ago at some charity performance. It was love at first sight.’

‘You don’t mean they are having an affair?’

‘No, no, of course not,’ said Moreland, speaking as if he were quite shocked at the notion, ‘how absurd to suggest such a thing. You can have a passion for someone without having an affair with them. That is one of the things no one seems able to understand these days.’

‘What is it then?’

‘Just one of those fascinating mutual attractions between improbable people that take place from time to time. I should like to write a ballet round it.’

‘Norman is interested too? He sounded a bit unwilling to go out to supper.’

‘Perhaps not interested in the sense you mean,’ said Moreland, ‘but everyone likes being fallen in love with. People who pretend they don’t are always the ones, beyond all others, to wring the last drop of pleasure – usually sadistic pleasure-out of it. Besides, Norman has begun to live rather a Ritzy life with her, he tells me. Some people like that too.’

‘I think Norman is quite keen,’ said Matilda, adding some final touches to her face that made completion of her toilet seem promising. ‘Did you hear the way he was talking? Not at all like himself. I think the only thing that holds him back is fear of old friends like Max Pilgrim laughing.’

‘Norman obviously represents the physical type of the future,’ Moreland said, abandoning, as he so often did, the particular aspect of the matter under discussion in favour of a more general aesthetic bearing. ‘The great artists have always decided beforehand what form looks are to take in the world, and Norman is pure Picasso – one of those attenuated, androgynous mountebanks of the Blue Period, who haven’t had a meal for weeks.’