influences of inanimate things in the gay, crowded room.

"Is that you, Mrs. Trevise? It's G.J. speaking. G.J.... Hoape. Yes.
Listen. I'm at Concepcion's for lunch, and I want you to come over as
quickly as you can. I've got very bad news indeed--the worst possible.
Carlos has been killed at the Front. What? Yes, awful, isn't it? She
doesn't know. I have the job of telling her."

Now that the words had been spoken in Concepcion's abode the reality
of Carlos Smith's death seemed more horribly convincing than before.
And G.J., speaker of the words, felt almost as guilty as though he
himself were responsible for the death. When he had rung off he stood
motionless in the room until the opening of the door startled him.
Concepcion appeared.

"If you've done corrupting my innocent telephone ..." she said, "lunch
is cooling."

He felt a murderer.

At the lunch-table she might have been a genuine South American.
Nobody could be less like Christine than she was; and yet in those
instants she incomprehensibly reminded him of Christine. Then she
started to talk in her old manner of a professional and renowned
talker. G.J. listened attentively. They ate. It was astounding that
he could eat. And it was rather surprising that she did not cry out:
"G.J. What the devil's the matter with you to-day?" But she went on
talking evenly, and she made him recount his doings. He related the
conversation at the club, and especially what Bob, the retired judge,
had said about equilibrium on the Western Front. She did not want to