in the vestibule, which concealed behind its powdered glass a modern
electric bulb, the turrets, dimly discerned by the light from the
avenue, combined to make an appeal to the historical imagination.

To Leigh, seeing the house thus for the first time, it appeared a
peculiarly appropriate habitat for Bishop Wycliffe; for he was one that
carried the stamp of his profession in his very bearing, and in every
lineament of his face. It was more difficult to imagine a young and
charming woman housed in such a place, but his first glimpse of the
bishop's daughter showed him that her Pagan beauty was emphasized
rather than lessened by contrast with her surroundings.

She was sitting in the drawing-room to the left of the entrance hall,
bending over a book. If she heard the entrance of her visitors into
the hall, she made no sign, but kept her eyes bent upon her novel, the
left-hand side of which, supported on her knee, had grown to the
thickness of half an inch. Only a few pages remained unread, half
lifted on the other side, above which her ivory paper knife hung
suspended. Clothed in a yellow gown and sitting in a flood of yellow
light that radiated from the shaded lamp beside her, she presented an
extraordinarily vivid picture against the brown panelling of the wall.
Even in repose one divined the suppressed energy of the figure, a
quality indicated by the almost imperceptible movement of the small
slipper that peeped beyond the border of her gown, and by the gentle
heaving of the lace at her throat. Yet there was something in the
graceful abandon of her attitude reminiscent of the women of the South.

So struck was Leigh by this picture, and by the fact that his hope of
meeting again the goddess of the maple walk was about to be realized,
that Cardington was well on his way up the stairs before he hurried in