offered her hand to Mills very frankly as to an old friend. Within
the extraordinarily wide sleeve, lined with black silk, I could see
the arm, very white, with a pearly gleam in the shadow. But to me
she extended her hand with a slight stiffening, as it were a recoil
of her person, combined with an extremely straight glance. It was
a finely shaped, capable hand. I bowed over it, and we just
touched fingers. I did not look then at her face.

Next moment she caught sight of some envelopes lying on the round
marble-topped table in the middle of the hall. She seized one of
them with a wonderfully quick, almost feline, movement and tore it
open, saying to us, "Excuse me, I must . . . Do go into the dining-
room. Captain Blunt, show the way."

Her widened eyes stared at the paper. Mr. Blunt threw one of the
doors open, but before we passed through it we heard a petulant
exclamation accompanied by childlike stamping with both feet and
ending in a laugh which had in it a note of contempt.

The door closed behind us; we had been abandoned by Mr. Blunt. He
had remained on the other side, possibly to soothe. The room in
which we found ourselves was long like a gallery and ended in a
rotunda with many windows. It was long enough for two fireplaces
of red polished granite. A table laid out for four occupied very
little space. The floor inlaid in two kinds of wood in a bizarre
pattern was highly waxed, reflecting objects like still water.

Before very long Dona Rita and Blunt rejoined us and we sat down
around the table; but before we could begin to talk a dramatically
sudden ring at the front door stilled our incipient animation.