continued, glancing towards the large tabby-marked
cat that lay in considerable ease in a corner of the divan. "He lies
there, purring and dreaming, shifting his limbs now and then in an
ecstasy of cushioned comfort. He seems the incarnation of everything
soft and silky and velvety, without a sharp edge in his composition, a
dreamer whose philosophy is sleep and let sleep; and then, as evening
draws on, he goes out into the garden with a red glint in his eyes and
slays a drowsy sparrow."

"As every pair of sparrows hatches out ten or more young ones in the
year, while their food supply remains stationary, it is just as well that
the Attabs of the community should have that idea of how to pass an
amusing afternoon," said Gregory. Having delivered himself of this sage
comment he lit another cigarette, bade Jocantha a playfully affectionate
good-bye, and departed into the outer world.

"Remember, dinner's a wee bit earlier to-night, as we're going to the
Haymarket," she called after him.

Left to herself, Jocantha continued the process of looking at her life
with placid, introspective eyes. If she had not everything she wanted in
this world, at least she was very well pleased with what she had got. She
was very well pleased, for instance, with the snuggery, which contrived
somehow to be cosy and dainty and expensive all at once. The porcelain
was rare and beautiful, the Chinese enamels took on wonderful tints in
the firelight, the rugs and hangings led the eye through sumptuous
harmonies of colouring. It was a room in which one might have suitably
entertained an ambassador or an archbishop, but it was also a room in
which one could cut out pictures for a scrap-book without feeling that
one was scandalising the deities of the place with one's litter. And as
with the snuggery, so with the rest of the house, and as with the house,
so with the other departments of Jocantha's life; she really had good
reason for being one of the most contented women in Chelsea.

From being in a mood of simmering satisfaction with her lot she passed to
the phase of being generously commiserating for those thousands around
her whose lives and circumstances were dull, cheap, pleasureless, and
empty. Work girls, shop assistants and so forth, the class that have
neither the happy-go-lucky freedom of the poor nor the leisured freedom
of the rich, came specially within the range of her sympathy. It was sad
to think that there were young