hand--his hands were large, but smooth and well shaped--his left
remaining under the cloth, beneath which the child's right hand, when
free, would likewise disappear. For a while the conversation consisted
chiefly of anecdotes by Mr. Airlie. There were few public men and women
about whom he did not know something to their disadvantage. Joan,
listening, found herself repeating the experience of a night or two
previous, when, during a performance of _Hamlet_, Niel Singleton, who was
playing the grave-digger, had taken her behind the scenes. Hamlet, the
King of Denmark and the Ghost were sharing a bottle of champagne in the
Ghost's dressing-room: it happened to be the Ghost's birthday. On her
return to the front of the house, her interest in the play was gone. It
was absurd that it should be so; but the fact remained.

Mr. Airlie had lunched the day before with a leonine old gentleman who
every Sunday morning thundered forth Social Democracy to enthusiastic
multitudes on Tower Hill. Joan had once listened to him and had almost
been converted: he was so tremendously in earnest. She now learnt that
he lived in Curzon Street, Mayfair, and filled, in private life, the
perfectly legitimate calling of a company promoter in partnership with a
Dutch Jew. His latest prospectus dwelt upon the profits to be derived
from an amalgamation of the leading tanning industries: by means of which
the price of leather could be enormously increased.

It was utterly illogical; but her interest in the principles of Social
Democracy was gone.

A very little while ago, Mr. Airlie, in his capacity of second cousin to
one of the ladies concerned, a charming girl but impulsive, had been
called upon to attend a family council of a painful nature. The
gentleman's name took Joan's breath away: it was the name of one of her