confounded, clumsy meddler. The Fynes watched the door, the closed
street door inimical somehow to their benevolent thoughts, the face of
the house cruelly impenetrable. It was just as on any other day. The
unchanged daily aspect of inanimate things is so impressive that Fyne
went back into the room for a moment, picked up the paper again, and ran
his eyes over the item of news. No doubt of it. It looked very bad. He
came back to the window and Mrs. Fyne. Tired out as she was she sat
there resolute and ready for responsibility. But she had no suggestion
to offer. People do fear a rebuff wonderfully, and all her audacity was
in her thoughts. She shrank from the incomparably insolent manner of the
governess. Fyne stood by her side, as in those old-fashioned photographs
of married couples where you see a husband with his hand on the back of
his wife's chair. And they were about as efficient as an old photograph,
and as still, till Mrs. Fyne started slightly. The street door had swung
open, and, bursting out, appeared the young man, his hat (Mrs. Fyne
observed) tilted forward over his eyes. After him the governess slipped
through, turning round at once to shut the door behind her with care.
Meantime the man went down the white steps and strode along the pavement,
his hands rammed deep into the pockets of his fawn overcoat. The woman,
that woman of composed movements, of deliberate superior manner, took a
little run to catch up with him, and directly she had caught up with him
tried to introduce her hand under his arm. Mrs. Fyne saw the brusque
half turn of the fellow's body as one avoids an importunate contact,
defeating her attempt rudely. She did not try again but kept pace with
his stride, and Mrs. Fyne watched them, walking independently, turn the
corner of the street side by side, disappear for ever.

The Fynes looked at each other eloquently, doubtfully: What do you think
of this? Then with common accord turned their eyes back to the street
door, closed, massive, dark; the great, clear-brass knocker shining in a