malachite, the ceiling was of darker marble inlaid with white intaglios.
Scattered everywhere were tables and cabinets laden with celadon
china, and carved jade, and ivories, and shimmering Persian and
Rhodian vessels. In all the room there was scarcely anything of
metal and no touch of gilding or bright colour. The light came
from green alabaster censers, and the place swam in a cold green
radiance like some cavern below the sea. The air was warm and scented,
and though it was very quiet there, a hum of voices and the strains
of dance music drifted to it from the pillared corridor in which
could be seen the glare of lights from the great ballroom beyond.

The young man had a thin face with lines of suffering round the
mouth and eyes. The warm room had given him a high colour, which
increased his air of fragility. He felt a little choked by the
place, which seemed to him for both body and mind a hot-house,
though he knew very well that the Nirski Palace on this gala evening
was in no way typical of the land or its masters. Only a week ago
he had been eating black bread with its owner in a hut on the
Volhynian front.

"You have become amazing, Saskia," he said. "I won't pay my old
playfellow compliments; besides, you must be tired of them. I wish
you happiness all the day long like a fairy-tale Princess. But a
crock like me can't do much to help you to it. The service seems to
be the wrong way round, for here you are wasting your time talking
to me."

She put her hand on his. "Poor Quentin! Is the leg very bad?"

He laughed. "O, no. It's mending famously. I'll be able to get