"I am ready now," he said; and then as they went downstairs together, he
added contritely: "After this I'll try to remember."

"I hope you will, my dear. It vexes your father." Even in his childhood
Stephen had understood that his father's "vexation" existed only as an
instrument of correction in the hands of his mother. Though he had
discovered by the time he was three years old that the image was nothing
more than a nursery bugaboo, there were occasions still when the figure
was solemnly dressed up and paraded before his eyes.

"So it's the Dad, bless him!" he exclaimed, for if he loved his mother
in spite of her virtues, he joined heartily in the family worship of the
head of the house. "Well, he has had a word with Margaret anyway, and he
ought to thank me for that."

"Dear Margaret," murmured Mrs. Culpeper, "she is looking so sweet
to-night."

That Margaret was looking very sweet indeed, Stephen acknowledged as
soon as he entered the room, where the firelight suffused the Persian
rugs (which had replaced the earlier Brussels carpet woven in a mammoth
floral design), the elaborately carved and twisted rosewood chairs and
sofas, upholstered in ruby-coloured brocade, the few fine old pieces of
Chippendale or Heppelwhite, the massive crystal chandelier, and the
precise copies of Italian paintings in gorgeous Florentine frames. Here
and there hung a family portrait, one of Amanda Culpeper, a famous
English beauty, with a long nose and a short upper lip, not unlike
Victoria's. This painting, which was supposed to be by Sir Joshua
Reynolds, was a source of unfailing consolation to Victoria, though
Stephen preferred the Sully painting of his grandmother, Judith