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rather dull,” said Cherry. “What I should adore is one of those long, slinky, thin ones, bright emerald green, with a forked tongue. And it must be long enough to go three times round my arm and then do a sort of coil round the neck.”
    “I hate snakes,” said Caroline in her soft voice.
    She was wearing green too—a bright stuff patterned with silver. It had long sleeves and a high draped neck. Richard thought, “She looks like leaves coming out in the spring. Oh, Caroline darling!” But on the surface he produced a slightly cynical smile and observed,
    “Let us by all means get up a family subscription and present Cherry with a garter snake for her next birthday.”
    Cherry laughed her fleeting laugh.
    “Oh, Dicky—how wizard! But why a garter? Do I know them?”
    “I believe they are green—and—very poisonous.”
    “And that’s what you get for calling him Dicky,” said Maurice.
    The Wadlows came back into the circle at what Rachel felt to be an opportune moment. What was the matter with Cherry?… Jealous of Caroline?… Yes, undoubtedly…
    Attracted by Richard?… Perhaps… Oh poor Cherry—what a waste of time!
    She came back to hear Richard say,
    “You’ve met Gale Brandon, haven’t you, Rachel?”
    “Yes—quite a number of times. In fact I always seem to be meeting him. But I didn’t know you knew him.”
    “Ah! He’s a prospective client. Merrivale introduced us, and he wants me to build him a very odd kind of a house, as far as I can make out. We had rather a disconnected sort of conversation, because Merrivale was telling a long story about how he photographed a lion on the Zambesi. At least, it started by being a story about a lion, but a lot of other beasts seemed to crop up as it went along. Merrivale was holding forth in front of the fire like he always does, and this man Gale Brandon had me by the arm walking me up and down and telling me all about how to build a house, so that the whole thing got rather mixed up, and my idea that the house is going to be on the odd side may be due to the way Merrivale’s lions and alligators and baboons and things kept bounding in and out of the conversation. By the way, a further complication was that the man Brandon kept breaking off to talk about Whincliff Edge. It appeared to be a good deal on his mind, but whether it was the house that he admired or you, Rachel, I couldn’t quite make out.”
    Rachel smiled.
    “He’s an American, you know. I think he admires everything. He hasn’t been over here very long, and he’s full of enthusiasm. I believe he even admires our climate, but I expect today has shaken him there.”
    “I’ll tell you something he doesn’t admire,” said Richard, “and that is our Louisa. He asked me in his ingenuous manner why you had had a vinegar plant installed.”
    Cherry giggled. Mabel Wadlow pursed her lips and murmured “Impertinent!” Ernest gazed judicially through his tilted lenses and pronounced,
    “Really most offensive. He shouldn’t have said that.”
    With the cold light of controversy in his eyes Maurice intervened.
    “Nobody could possibly like Louisa—she’s a thoroughly disagreeable woman. But that is not her fault—it’s’the fault of your damned capitalism. You take one person, and you give them money, power, position, authority. You take another—”
    Caroline’s eyes danced suddenly. She leaned to Richard and said at his very ear, “He’s going to call Louisa a wage-slave—I feel it in my bones,” and even as she said it, Maurice did.
    “You make her a wage-slave, relying for her very bread upon a condition of servile dependency—”
    Cherry’s laugh rang out.
    “Well, I shouldn’t have called Louisa servile,” she said, and for once everyone agreed with her.
    “Louisa is dreadfully rude,” said Caroline. “Even to Rachel. Even to Noisy—isn’t she, adored angel?”
    Neusel had the middle of the hearthrug. The melting note in Caroline’s voice induced him to lift