the instant, only that space sufficed for the flash of a wild
question. Was NOT Mrs. Creston dead?--the ambiguity met him there
in the short drop of her husband's voice, the drop conjugal, if it
ever was, and in the way the two figures leaned to each other.
Creston, making a step to look at something else, came nearer,
glanced at him, started and exclaimed--behaviour the effect of
which was at first only to leave Stransom staring, staring back
across the months at the different face, the wholly other face, the
poor man had shown him last, the blurred ravaged mask bent over the
open grave by which they had stood together. That son of
affliction wasn't in mourning now; he detached his arm from his
companion's to grasp the hand of the older friend. He coloured as
well as smiled in the strong light of the shop when Stransom raised
a tentative hat to the lady. Stransom had just time to see she was
pretty before he found himself gaping at a fact more portentous.
"My dear fellow, let me make you acquainted with my wife."

Creston had blushed and stammered over it, but in half a minute, at
the rate we live in polite society, it had practically become, for
our friend, the mere memory of a shock. They stood there and
laughed and talked; Stransom had instantly whisked the shock out of
the way, to keep it for private consumption. He felt himself
grimace, he heard himself exaggerate the proper, but was conscious
of turning not a little faint. That new woman, that hired
performer, Mrs. Creston? Mrs. Creston had been more living for him
than any woman but one. This lady had a face that shone as
publicly as the jeweller's window, and in the happy candour with
which she wore her monstrous character was an effect of gross
immodesty. The character of Paul Creston's wife thus attributed to
her was monstrous for reasons Stransom could judge his friend to