‘Well,’ said the novelist, ‘Catcomb tells me that Blandfoot wants to show the picture to you.’

Mrs. Marling said nothing. Thoughts crowded into her mind: her youth when she had had Settlemarsh at her feet, the parties she had given, the people from the great world who had graced them, the larger ambitions she had entertained but which she had abandoned from cautiousness, from laziness, from conscience, for a dozen reasons. She thought of her empire which, like the Roman Empire under Hadrian, was now technically at its greatest extent. She had maintained it for many years against every kind of opposition and difficulty: assault, intrigue, her own diminished resources. The advent of Mr. Blandfoot troubled her, and taxed her powers as they had not been taxed for a long time. To the world of Settlemarsh it seemed that she was merely reserving her fire. But she knew too well that in her inactivity there lurked a grain of fatigue. She was not really weighing the reasons for and against Mr. Blandfoot’s admission into her charmed circle; she was shirking her responsibilities as the mentor of Settlemarsh, she was letting things slide. And it troubled her the more to feel this lethargy, because she was aware that Mr. Blandfoot was already a centre of disaffection and revolt, and that he must be definitely assimilated into her system, or rejected from it. And her own indifference to whether he was admitted or not alarmed her: it was like the sound of the footsteps of old age gaining upon her. She must pull herself together and take the field. After all, what better occasion than the present, with a renowned novelist at her side to support her, supposing she needed support? She turned to Mr. Hesketh, who was meditatively eyeing the decanter.

‘Dear Arthur, it must be very dull for you alone with such a fossil as me.’

‘Alice, how can you say such a thing?’ he protested.

‘Oh no, oh no,’ she said, ‘in spite of your beautiful manners, I can see your eye wandering whenever I begin these long sentimental anecdotes about my early years. I see I am becoming a bore. Don’t say “no” again. I can’t bear to be contradicted. But I tell you what I’m going to do: I’m going to give a party for all those second-rate people you despise so much! For one evening at least their bungalows will know them no more. Then you will realize that I, like you, am a public benefactor. To make it amusing for them I shall say that you are here. And to make it amusing for you—do you know what I shall do?’

‘Alice, you derange yourself too much!’ murmured the novelist.

‘I shall invite Mr. Blandfoot to come and show us his picture!’

‘Ah!’cried Mr. Hesketh.

‘And now,’ said Mrs. Marling, rising briskly, ‘I shall go and join the ladies. You must stay here and drink some port. You simply haven’t had any! What would my husband say, if he saw that poor little decanter still groaning with wine!’

Mr. Hesketh held the door open for her and she passed out of the room, a slender, distinguished figure, seeming somehow to take up even less space than her scanty envelope of flesh demanded. To say that she fitted her rich heavy ugly surroundings did not do her justice; but her presence completed a harmony whose innate grace and rarity the amateur of life immediately recognized. Mr. Hesketh, watching her go, suddenly felt grateful for her. A warm sentimental emotion welled up in his heart—when she dies, he thought, she can never be replaced. He tried to find words to describe that felicitous relationship between her and her possessions in which her charm seemed to reside. He fancied that the objects she passed made obeisance to her and that her graciousness flowed out, enveloping them in its gentle radiance. But the remembered asperity of her nature kept pricking his honeyed thoughts of her; and returning to his port, he gave up trying to enclose her in a formula.

Alone in the drawing-room, Mrs. Marling sat down at her bureau. She took out an envelope and wrote ‘—Blandfoot, Esq.’ Then she hesitated. So written, the name had an unceremonious, unfriendly air. It reminded her that she did not know Mr. Blandfoot: perhaps he would resent being prefixed by a dash. She entertained the thought, however, only to dismiss it. Who, among the servile population of Settlemarsh would not be flattered to hear from her, by whatever style she addressed them? For a moment she indulged her imagination with a prevision of her party, and the room, as though aware of her thought, glowed softly back at her, loosing for her all its influences of comfort and dignity and order and security. The words flowed easily from her pen as she wrote to the unknown art collector.

At nine o’clock the next morning the maid knocked at Mr. Blandfoot’s bedroom door—knocked several times, though with an air of misgiving. At last she heard a growl: ‘Come in!’ The room was so dark she could see nothing and she paused on the threshold.

‘How often have I told you,’ said a voice, ‘not to come until I ring.’

‘Yes, sir,’ said the maid, timidly.

‘Well, come in, if you’re coming,’ said the voice, still implacable.

There was a vast heaving movement on the bed.

‘Now the curtains, now the blinds, now the hot water, now the bath,’ the voice chanted rapidly and irritably, ‘and you haven’t told me why you came at all yet.’

‘Please, sir,’ said the maid, stumbling towards the window, ‘there’s a letter marked “urgent”, so I thought——’

‘Why didn’t you say so before?’ snapped the voice. ‘Well, hand it over.’

But in her flurry the maid had dropped the letter. She groped for it on the floor, obscurely feeling that she must not pull up the blind until she had given her master the letter. She did not know whereabouts in the room she was; she thought she must be near the bed, but she was afraid to touch it and every moment her movements grew more rigid.

‘I had it only just now,’ she murmured, almost crying.

‘Clumsy, clumsy,’ admonished the voice, in gender accents. ‘Here, I’ve got it.’

‘Oh, that’s all right then, sir,’ said the maid, almost gasping with relief.

‘No,’ said the voice, drawing nearer.

‘I want you to give it to me.’

Bewildered, the maid held out her hand in the darkness.

‘No, just a little more this way,’ persuaded the voice, still advancing to meet her.

Again she stumbled forward in the gloom, her hand stretched stiff like a fencer’s. Mr. Blandfoot seemed to have reared himself up in the bed: she could see a vague outline towering above her.

‘A shade to the left now,’ said the voice.

The maid obeyed.

‘And now straight into the letter-box.’

She made a half-hearted prodding movement. Something caught her finger: a sharp pain ran down her arm. She called out, and the whole room was suddenly flooded with light. Afterwards she realized it must have been electric light; but at the time she was aware only of the pain, of the sight of her finger wedged between Mr. Blandfoot’s large irregular teeth, and of his face looking down at her with a smile that had no kindness in it. The blankets were tumbled together in the middle of the bed; the floor, as much of it as she could see, was lumpy with sorry-looking underclothes: the biscuit-coloured walls refracted the unsympathetic light, as did also Mr. Blandfoot’s parchment-coloured face. The spiritless, yellow hues around her were infinitely uncomforting; she felt the world beginning to dissolve.

‘There’s the letter,’ remarked Mr. Blandfoot, ‘on the floor behind you.’

Her finger dropped from his mouth: obsequiously she picked up the letter and handed it to him. Her face was half averted; but she noticed that he pulled the jacket of his pyjamas more firmly across his chest, and this gesture, which seemed to recognize her right to be treated as a human being, restored her a little.