the fire in the drawing-room and discussed music with Norton Pyford.
Having sacrificed his watch on the altar of art, he had been compelled
to rely on appetite, with the result that he arrived just as eight was
striking. Lady Durwent did her best, but as she knew nothing of music,
nor he anything of anything else, the situation was becoming difficult,
when the entrance of Madame Carlotti brought welcome relief.

That lady was wearing a yellow gown rather too tight for her, so that
her somewhat ample flesh slightly overran the confines of the garment,
giving the effect that she had grown up in the thing and was unable to
shed it. This impression was heightened by a mannerism, repeated
frequently during the evening, of grasping her very low bodice with her
hands, exhausting her breath, pulling the bodice up, and compressing
herself into it. It was an innocent enough performance, but invariably
left the feeling that she should retire upstairs to do it.

She wore a yellow flower in her hair; her stockings were a rich yellow
with a superimposed pattern like strands of fine gold, and her dainty
feet were enclosed in a pair of bronzed shoes. As her lips were
heavily carmined and her eyes brilliantly dark, Madame Carlotti's was a
distinctly illuminating presence.

But the sunniness of her entrance was dimmed by the lack of audience.
She had not expended her genius to throw it away on a strangely dressed
young man whose hair fell straight and black over a large collar that
had earned a holiday some days before, and whose velvet jacket was
minus two buttons, the threads of which could still be seen,
out-stretched, appealing for their owners' return.

'Lucia, my dear,' said Lady Durwent, just like an ordinary hostess,