she went on amusing straker all evening, and after dinner she made him take her into the conservatory.

the conservatory at amberley is built out fanwise from the big west drawing-room on to the southwest corner of the terrace; it is furnished as a convenient lounge, and you sit there drinking coffee, and smoking, and admiring brocklebank's roses, which are the glory of amberley. and all among brocklebank's roses they came upon furnival and mrs. viveash.

among the roses she shimmered and flushed in a gown of rose and silver. among the roses she was lovely, sitting there with furnival. and straker saw that miss tarrant was aware of the loveliness of mrs. viveash, and that her instinct woke in her.

she advanced, trailing behind her the long, diaphanous web of her black gown. when she was well within the range of furnival's sensations she paused to smell a rose, bending her body backward and sideward so [pg 119] that she showed to perfection the deep curved lines that swept from her shoulders to her breasts, and from her breasts downward to her hips. a large diamond star hung as by an invisible thread upon her neck: it pointed downward to the hollow of her breasts. there was no beauty that she had that was not somehow pointed to, insisted on, held forever under poor furnival's excited eyes.

but in a black gown, among roses, she showed disadvantageously her dead whiteness and her morbid rose. she was aware of that. mrs. viveash, glowing among the roses, had made her aware.

"why did we ever come here?" she inquired of straker. "these roses are horribly unbecoming to me."

"nothing is unbecoming to you, and you jolly well know it," said furnival.

she ignored it.

"just look at their complexions. they oughtn't to be allowed about."

she picked one and laid it against the dead-white hollow of her breast, and curled her neck to look at it there; then she shook her head at it in disapproval, took it away, and held it out an inch from furnival's face. he recoiled slightly.

"it won't bite," she murmured. "it'll let you stroke it." she stroked it herself, with fingers drawn tenderly, caressingly, over petals smooth and cool as their own skin. "i believe it can feel. i believe it likes it."

furnival groaned. straker heard him; so did mrs. viveash. she stirred in her seat, causing a spray of dorothy perkins to shake as if it indeed felt and shared her terror. miss tarrant turned from furnival and laid her rose on mrs. viveash's shoulder, where it did no wrong. [pg 120]

"it's yours," she said; "or a part of you."

mrs. viveash looked up at furnival, and her face flickered for a moment. furnival did not see her face; he was staring at miss tarrant.

"ah," he cried, "how perfect! you and i'll have to dry up, straker, unless you can go one better than that."

"i shouldn't dream," said straker, "of trying to beat miss tarrant at her own game."

"if you know what it is. i'm hanged if i do."

furnival was tearing from its tree a caroline testout, one of brocklebank's choicest blooms. miss tarrant cried out:

"oh, stop him, somebody. they're mr. brocklebank's roses."

"they ain't a part of brockles," furnival replied.

he approached her with brocklebank's caroline testout, and, with his own dangerous, his outrageous fervor, "you say it f-f-feels," he stammered. "it's what you want, then—something t-tender and living about you. not that s-scin-t-tillating thing you've got there. it tires me to look at it." he closed his eyes.

"you needn't look at it," she said.

"i can't help it. it's part of you. i believe it grows there. it makes me look at it."

his words came shaken from him in short, savage jerks. to straker, to mrs. viveash, he appeared intolerable; but he had ceased to care how he appeared to anybody. he had ceased to know that they were there. they turned from him as from something monstrous, intolerable, indecent. mrs. viveash's hands and mouth were quivering, and her eyes implored straker to take her away somewhere where she couldn't see furnival and philippa tarrant. [pg 121]

he took her out on to the terrace. miss tarrant looked after them.

"that rose belongs to mrs. viveash now," she said. "you'd better go and take it to her."

furnival flung the caroline testout on the floor. he trod on the caroline testout. it was by accident, but still he trod on it; so that he seemed much more brutal than he was.

"it's very hot in here," said she. "i'm going on to the terrace."

"let's go down," said he, "into the garden. we can talk there."

"you seem to be able to talk anywhere," said she.

"i have to," said furnival.

she went out and walked slowly down the terrace to the east end where straker sheltered mrs. viveash.

furnival followed her.

"are you coming with me or are you not?" he insisted. "i can't get you a minute to myself. come out of this, can't you? i want to talk to you."

"and i," said miss tarrant, "want to talk to mrs. viveash."

"you don't. you want to tease her. can't you leave the poor woman alone for a minute? she's happy there with straker."

"i want to see how happy she is," said miss tarrant.

"for god's sake!" he cried. "don't. it's my last chance. i'm going to-morrow." miss tarrant continued to walk like one who did not hear. "i may never see you again. you'll go off somewhere. you'll disappear. i can't trust you."

suddenly she stood still.

"you are going to-morrow?"

"not," said furnival, "if you'd like me to stay. that's what i want to talk to you about. let's go [pg 122] down into the east walk. it's dark there, and they can't hear us."

"they have heard you. you'd better go back to mrs. viveash."

his upper lip lifted mechanically, but he made no sound. he stood for a moment staring at her, obstructing her path. then he turned.

"i shall go back to her," he said.

he strode to mrs. viveash and called her by her name. his voice had a queer vibration that sounded to miss tarrant like a cry.

"nora—you'll come with me, won't you?"

mrs. viveash got up without a word and went with him. miss tarrant, standing beside straker on the terrace, saw them go down together into the twilight of the east walk between the yew hedges.

philippa said something designed to distract straker's attention; and still, with an air of distracting him, of sheltering her sad sister, mrs. viveash, she led him back into the house.

furnival returned five minutes later, more flushed than ever and defiant.

that night straker, going down the long corridor to his bedroom, saw fanny brocklebank and philippa in front of him. they went slowly, fanny's head leaning a little toward philippa's. not a word of what philippa was saying reached straker, but he saw her turn with fanny into fanny's room. as he passed the door he was aware of fanny's voice raised in deprecation, and of philippa's, urgent, imperative; and he knew, as well as if he had heard her, that philippa was telling fanny about furnival and nora viveash.