wander to the farther end of the room. The expression of her face
was cold, preoccupied; she bit her lower lip so that the under part
of it protruded.

'Where have you been, Clara?' her father asked.

She did not answer immediately, but finished drawing off her gloves
and rolled them up by turning one over the other. Then she said
indifferently:

'I've been to see Mrs. Tubbs.'

'And who gave you leave?' asked Hewett with irritation.

'I don't see that I needed any leave. I knew she was coming here to
speak to you or mother, so I went, after work, to ask what you'd
said.'

She was not above the middle stature of women, but her slimness and
erectness, and the kind of costume she wore made her seem tall as
she stood in this low-ceiled room. Her features were of very
uncommon type, at once sensually attractive and bearing the stamp of
intellectual vigour. The profile was cold, subtle, original; in full
face, her high cheekbones and the heavy, almost horizontal line of
her eyebrows were the points that first drew attention, conveying an
idea of force of character. The eyes themselves were hazel-coloured,
and, whatever her mood, preserved a singular pathos of expression, a
look as of self-pity, of unconscious appeal against some injustice.
In contrast with this her lips were defiant, insolent, unscrupulous;
a shadow of the naivete of childhood still lingered upon