Paul's room was a large one at the back on the second floor. It looked into the elm tree, and was very pleasant and quiet.

A few days after Mrs. Walbridge had sent the manuscript of "Lord Effingham" to her publishers, she was in Paul's room, helping him hang a new picture that he had picked up at a sale. His mother thought it a very ugly picture; in fact, she thought it not nice, but she said nothing, for her opinion was of no value to him, and she knew it.

It was a sunshiny day, and the naked boughs of the old tree stirred and made odd little noises as the east wind attacked it in gusts. The shadows of the branches danced across the dull green walls and made the gleams of light on the picture glasses die and come to life again in a way that gave the large room something the air of a glade in a wood.

Paul, in his shirt-sleeves, stood on a pair of steps hammering a nail into the exact spot in the wall that he had decided on after long measurement and reflection.

"I do hope you're wearing your thick Jaegers, darling," his mother said, as she took the hammer from him and held up the picture.

"Not yet," he said. "I'm going to put them on to-morrow." He hung up the picture and backed gravely off the ladder, looking up at it, a smile of pride and satisfaction softening his over-delicate, rather supercilious face. "A little gem, Mother, though you probably don't think so," he announced good-naturedly. "Bruce Collier wanted it. He's got a fine collection."

"Bruce Collier," Mrs. Walbridge pursed her lips thoughtfully. "I've heard his name. Who is he, Paul?"

"The chap who wrote 'Reek.' Crichell was talking about him here one night in the summer. There's the book an the table. He gave it to me."

She picked the book up and opened it. "What beautiful paper," she said slowly, "and I love the print, Paul."

He nodded. "Oh, yes. Nares publishes him. Now I'm going to put the Kakemono here, Mother." He indicated a blank space on the wall near his writing-table. "Will you get it? You won't be sorry to have it out of the girls' room, will you?"

She went obediently towards the door, and at it she turned.

"You'll be surprised, dear, but, do you know, I have got quite used to those monkeys, and really like them now!"

He looked up from filling his pipe and smiled at her, his narrow face—a face of a type so often seen nowadays in very young men—too small-featured, too clean-cut, too narrow in the brow, too lacking in the big old British qualities, both good and bad, and yet full of uncreative cleverness—lighted by whimsical, not unkindly, astonishment.

"'Violet Walbridge confesses to a passion for Honobosa Iccho,'" he declaimed, as if quoting a possible headline. "No, no, Mother darling, that won't do. You must stick to Marcus Stone. Trot along and get it, there's a dear."

She trotted along and got it, and brought it back, carefully rolled on its stick.

"Grisel will be sorry to find it gone," she said, as he hung it on the nail and let it slowly slide down the wall. "She loves it."

"She loves it because Wick knew about the artist. Imitative little monkey, Grisel."

His mother stared at him. It was on her lips to say, "So are you—so are you an imitative monkey," for she realised that these new artistic tastes of his were derived from some model and not from any instinctive search for a peculiar kind of beauty. Instead she only said, referring to an old pet name of her own for her children, "Yes, one of God's apelets, and so are you, Paul."

He had backed to the far side of the room and stood surveying the effect of the Kakemono with much satisfaction.

"Yes, dear," he murmured, without listening to her. "That's very good, just there. The light catches it just right."

As he spoke, Jessie, the maid, came in, still straightening a hastily tied-on cap and apron.

"A gentleman downstairs to see you, sir."

Paul nodded.

"Oh, Mr. Crichell! We're going to the Grafton Galleries together to see that 'Moonlight in the Trenches' fellow's pictures."

"Please, Mr. Paul, it ain't Mr. Crichell." Jessie was still standing by the door.

"Oh, who is it?"

"I don't know, sir. Not at all a nice gentleman. I wouldn't leave him alone in the drorin'-room if I was you."

The girl left the room, and Mrs. Walbridge sat down suddenly. Paul's face had changed, and she was frightened.

"Look here, Mother," he said, "I'm afraid it's a brute of a fellow on business. I told him I'd kill him if he came here, but"—the young man waved his long, nervous hands helplessly—"he's come, you see."

Her big hollow eyes were fixed on him with a strained, unwinking stare.

"Oh, Paul," she whispered, "what is it?"

He moved irresolutely towards the door, came back, took up his coat and then threw it on to the divan under the Rowlandson "Horse Fair."

"Look here, Mother," he said, "I must get him out of the house. Suppose you go and tell him—tell him that I'm not in. Perhaps you'd better say that I'm out of town."

"Is it a bill?" she asked tonelessly, without moving.

"No—that is—not exactly. The fact is, it's a money-lender. Alfred Brock put me on to a good thing in the City, and it—it went wrong somehow, so I borrowed fifty pounds of this chap—Somerset's his name—and I—— But go and tell him I'm out. I'll explain it all to you afterwards," he broke off nervously.

She walked to the window and stood looking out, and he thought she was crying.

"Don't, Mother, please don't," he exclaimed. "It's quite all right. I shall have the money next week, and the brute's just got to wait, that's all."

But she was not crying, and that was not why she had turned her face from him. And what she saw, oddly enough, as she looked out into the empty boughs of the elm tree, was the face of old Mrs. Wick, whose picture young Wick carried in his pocket, and had once shown her. "What a happy woman, what a happy woman!" she was saying under her breath. After a pause she turned round.

"I'll not say you're out, Paul, and I won't say you're away. I'll see the man, and I'll tell him you'll pay him next week."

Across his white face flashed the wild impatience of the man who, knowing that there is for his ailment only one remedy and that a desperate one, is offered some homely, perfectly inefficacious substitute.

"Don't be a——" he broke out. But she went downstairs without heeding him.

The man stood in the middle of the drawing-room, looking round at the homely furniture. Being what she was, Mrs. Walbridge had, of course, expected a florid and bediamonded Jew, instead of which the man was a stocky, red-faced, snub-nosed Englishman, who approached to her innocent ideal of a prize-fighter.

"Good morning."

At her voice he whirled round and about awkwardly.

"Sorry to trouble you, m'm, I'm sure," he began, grasping the situation with what to her seemed marvellous quickness. "Young gentleman had better come down hisself."

"My son——" she began.

But he waved her into silence with a small, roughcast looking hand.

"No good sayin' he's out of town, ma'am, or even spendin' the day on the river, 'cos he ain't."

Mrs. Walbridge looked at him, a slow wave of understanding creeping to her brain.

"I wasn't going to tell you that my son is out, or away," she returned quietly. "He's upstairs. He's extremely sorry, but he will not be able to pay you your—your little account until next week."

The man stared at her in honest surprise, and then his red face melted into rather pleasant curves of irrepressible laughter.

"Well, I'll be—I'll be blowed!" he cried, slapping his knee. "Did he send you down to tell me that? My governor will laugh at that."

They talked, this ill-assorted pair, for about half an hour, and then the man left the house very quietly, bowing at the door with real respect to the lady who had so amused him. He had heard of Violet Walbridge all his life, and vaguely remembered having read "Queenie's Promise" when he was about sixteen, and had the mumps, and to think that she should be like this! Very much "blowed" and inclined to being damned, as he told his wife later, he disappeared out of Mrs. Walbridge's life.

She went upstairs, and found Paul walking up and down the room, smoking cigarettes furiously, his neglected pipe on the mantelpiece.

"Lord, Mother, what an age you've been!" he cried, petulantly. "Was it Somerset himself?"

"No, this man's name was Green. He tells me, Paul, that they have applied to you several times; that the money was due last week."

He nodded sulkily. "Yes, it was. If Alfred Brock hadn't been a fool, it wouldn't have happened. Brock shall never see a penny of my money again."

"He told me," his mother went on, her hand on the door handle, "that he knew you had a collection of pictures and things, and he—he was going to make you sell some of them."

"The swine! Poor mother," he added carelessly, "a nasty half hour for you, I'm afraid. What did you say to him to make him go?"

Mrs. Walbridge looked curiously round the room as if she saw it for the first time. The Rowlandson, the Kakemono, the exquisite little Muirhead, the French pastel that shocked her; the beautiful adjustable reading-chair, with its lectern-like bookrest; the fourteenth century Persian prayer rug; the odds and ends of good china on the mantelpiece. All these treasures, so dear to Paul, that she, in her innocence, had regarded as inexpensive whims, had received a new value through the odd medium of Mr. Green.

"I didn't say much to him, Paul," she answered slowly. "I—I paid him."

She went out and closed the door. The young man took a hasty step towards it, then hesitated and went back to his arm-chair. It was jolly decent of her. He'd thank her and give her a kiss for it at tea time. He must think of something graceful and appropriate to say. Meantime he was chilly and uncomfortable, so, leaning forward, he lit a match and set fire to the coal-heaped grate. "Jolly decent of mother," he thought, leaning back to watch the glowing of the fire. "Those absurd books of hers really are pretty useful, after all."

It was pleasant that evening to have a long letter from Grisel, and Mrs. Walbridge, who had been busy since Mr. Green's departure in getting off a basket of beef-tea, home-made potted meat, and red-currant jelly, to Torquay, and who had been bound by an old promise to take tea with poor Caroline, found the letter when she came in, and as Paul, after his hurried thanks, had gone out for the rest of the day and evening, she changed into her warm dressing-gown, and settled down to her supper tray in the drawing-room, with a pint of ale and a nicely browned sausage, and Grisel's letter.

Grisel wrote a peculiarly delightful hand, each letter small and well-shaped, and nearly as clear as print. She was also fluent and had a certain gift for description, so that her letters were a real treat to her mother. This one, written on several sheets of beautiful pale grey paper with "Conroy Hall" in one corner, promised to be an unusually delightful one, for it contained, she saw, glancing through it, a full description of the ball at which her daughter had worn the new satin shoes she had sent her from Swan & Edgars.

"Darling Mum," Griselda began, "I haven't written for several days because I've been having such a good time that there wasn't a minute for anything except frivoling! You'll gather from this that the poor old Dad is better, and his headaches have gone. I don't think it was anything but liver myself. And he's been hob-nobbing with some old friends who have turned up at one of the big hotels—I forget which.

"I came here the day before yesterday to stay with Elsie, and I've never had such a good time in my life. Fred has put an awful lot of money into the place and furnished it splendidly, so it's really wonderful. He's like a little white rat, it's no good concealing that, but then he's like such a very nice white rat, and he adores Elsie, and thinks nothing's too good for her. They've lived like fighting cocks all through the war. How they get the food I can't imagine! Of course, they make their own butter, and have swindled the Government like anything, which, of course, is great fun.

"Elsie has just had a lot of new clothes from London, and really looks a dream, although she's as fat as a little pig. Of course, they've done a lot of entertaining of wounded for years now, otherwise I don't think they would have known there is a war. Elsie says she's awfully glad there's no Vere de Vere blood in Fred, or he would have minded things more. He really is a typical nouveau riche out of a novel (not one of your novels, darling).

"Did I tell you how glad I was that you've got 'Lord Effingham' into shape? It'll be a relief to your poor mind. I found 'From Sunlight to Shadow' in the library, and have been reading it, and I think it's perfectly sweet. I really did enjoy it very much. It reminded me of Rosa N. Carey. How I used to love her books when I was a kid!

"We have no men-servants here, but Fred's going to get a dozen or so as soon as the Armistice is signed. Meantime there are swarms of lovely footmanettes, too pretty for words, in violet frocks and lace caps and aprons. They all look as if George Grossmith had drilled them, somehow. One rather expects them to burst out into song, but they don't.

"Well, the ball was a great success. I'm writing in bed. It's after lunch. We danced till after five, and I was such a belle, Mum! All the girls down here seem to be six foot tall, and many of them have that new uniform-walk—I'm sure serving in different corps made the women's feet all spread; they are big and thick about the ankles, too—so I appeared as the old-fashioned Christmas pantomime fairy, done in white and gold. That's what Fred said. My frock really was as good as anybody's, you darling. Hundreds of beautiful youths rolled up to contend for the honour of a dance. It really was fun after the over-femaled parties we have been to lately, and I felt like Queenie, or that girl in 'Touchstones,'—the cruel one who broke hearts. Oh, Mother darling, what a noodle you are not to know that it's the man who does the heart-breaking nowadays!

"Lady Sybil Ross was here with her twins. They looked just like partridge eggs, they're so speckly, but they're nice girls; but they treated me as if I was a little doll of some kind, as if they were surprised that I could talk and walk, being so small as I am. Fanny Ross has been engaged three times, and each time the man has been killed at the front. Isn't it awful? But I couldn't help laughing. There didn't seem to be any reason why she should stop being engaged to one after the other for ever, and it doesn't seem to hurt her in the least.

"Father came last night, of course, and you would have been proud of him; he looked such a beautiful old pet. Of course, his diet and the water wagon have done wonders for his looks. His eyes are as clear as a child's—or were the first part of the evening, but rather fell off towards the end (off the water wagon, I mean!) Of course, he was quite all right, you know, but he was very genial and his eyes a bit swimmy. Poor old Dad.

"Did I tell you that Clara Crichell's here? She's staying with her mother, who has taken a house, and she and Dad had the time of their lives together. She's very pretty, but towards the end of the evening she looked rather like a squashed tomato, I thought. Seriously, I think she's quite crazy about father. I'm so glad you're old-fashioned, darling, and that I don't have to chaperon you too. A frisky young mother is an awful responsibility for a girl, and I should hate to have to ask anyone's intentions about my Mamma!

"I've just had the most scrumptious lunch—heavenly sweetbreads in little paper boats, and eggs done in some wonderful French way, and grape-fruit salad, and a sweet little carafe like a scent-bottle, full of some divine white wine. I love having my meals in bed, and I adore having a maid to look after me. If I marry a rich man, never again as long as I live will I put on my stockings myself, I swear it!

"Well, I went to supper with an awfully nice boy (I forget his name), who urged me to marry him and share his pension as a 2nd Lieutenant. I've danced my new shoes to ribbons—war satin, of course—and the next evening frock I have must be black, darling. Lots of girls younger than I are wearing black, and it's so becoming.

"I had a ridiculous present from Oliver yesterday—four beautiful giant kippers tied up in blue ribbon. Of course, he thought I was at Mrs. Bishop's, but wasn't he a goose to send me kippers?

"By the way, I've a serious beau—a most charming old man, Sir John Barclay. He's perfectly delightful. Quite old and frightfully rich. Snow-white hair and the most lovely tenor voice. He's staying in the house, and, though I say it as shouldn't, is my slave. He sang 'The Banks of Allan Water' the other day, and made me cry. Such a sweet, young-sounding voice it is. He sent me the loveliest flowers this morning. Really, it looks very much as if he was going to offer himself and his worldly goods to me! I hope he doesn't, because he really is a dear, and he looks as if he might mind being hurt.

"How are you, dearest? You must enjoy being all alone. Do eat enough; don't live on toast and tea, and don't let Jessie forget your hot bottle.

"Dearest love to you,

"Grisel.

"P.S.—When you send me a new pair of slippers, please send me a pair of stockings too, as there are simply no soles left in my last pair."