ngworth, if she would go home early, back to Berkeley Square
without an escort. Her cult for her friend, though doubtless genuine,
evidently weakened when there was any question of the allegiance of men.
Craven made up his mind that he would not leave Lady Sellingworth until
they were at the door of Number 18A, Berkeley Square.

In the street he found himself by the side of Miss Van Tuyn, behind Lady
Sellingworth and Ambrose Jennings, who were really a living caricature
as they proceeded through the night towards Shaftesbury Avenue. The
smallness of Jennings, accentuated by his bat-like cloth cloak, his
ample sombrero and fantastically long stick, made Lady Sellingworth look
like a moving tower as she walked at his side, like a leaning tower when
she bent graciously to catch the murmur of his persistent conversation.
And as over the theatres in letters of fire were written the names
of the stars in the London firmament--Marie Lohr, Moscovitch, Elsie
Janis--so over, all over, Lady Sellingworth seemed to be written for
Craven to read: "I am really not a Bohemian."

"Do you genuinely wish Lady Sellingworth to finish the evening at the
Cafe Royal?" he asked of his companion.

"Yes. They would love her there. She would bring a new note."

"Probably. But would she love them?"

"I don't think you quite understand her," said Miss Van Tuyn.

"I'm quite sure I don't. Still--"

"In past years I am certain she has been to all the odd cafes of Paris."

"Perhaps. But one changes. And you yourself said there were--or was it
had been?--two Adela Sellingworths, and that you only knew one."

"Yes. But perhaps at the Cafe Royal I should get to know the other."

"May she not be dead?"

"I have a theory that nothing of us really dies while we live. Our abode
changes. We know that. But I believe the inhabitant is permanent. We are
what we were, with, of course, innumerable additions brought to us by
the years. For instance, I believe that Lady Sellingworth now is what
she was, to all intents and purposes, with additions which naturally
have made great apparent changes in her. An old moss-covered house,
overgrown with creepers, looks quite different from the same house when
it is new and bare. But go inside--the rooms are the same, and under the
moss and the creepers are the same walls."

"It may be so. But what a difference the moss and the creepers make.
Some may be climbing roses."

Craven felt the shrewd girlish eyes were lo