Soames pondered long and painfully over his answer, and late at night in
the dining-room, when Irene had gone to bed, he composed the following:

'62, MONTPELLIER SQUARE, S.W.,

'May 19, 1887.

'DEAR BOSINNEY,

'I think that in both our interests it would be extremely undesirable
that matters should be so left at this stage. I did not mean to say that
if you should exceed the sum named in my letter to you by ten or twenty
or even fifty pounds, there would be any difficulty between us. This
being so, I should like you to reconsider your answer. You have a "free
hand" in the terms of this correspondence, and I hope you will see your
way to completing the decorations, in the matter of which I know it is
difficult to be absolutely exact.

'Yours truly,

'SOAMES FORSYTE.'

Bosinney's answer, which came in the course of the next day, was:

'May 20.

'DEAR FORSYTE,

'Very well.

'PH. BOSINNEY.'

CHAPTER VI--OLD JOLYON AT THE ZOO

Old Jolyon disposed of his second Meeting--an ordinary Board--summarily.
He was so dictatorial that his fellow directors were left in cabal over
the increasing domineeringness of old Forsyte, which they were far from
intending to stand much longer, they said.

He went out by Underground to Portland Road Station, whence he took a
cab and drove to the Zoo.

He had an assignation there, one of those assignations that had lately
been growing more frequent, to which his increasing uneasiness about
June and the 'change in her,' as he expressed it, was driving him.

She buried herself away, and was growing thin; if he spoke to her he got
no answer, or had his head snapped off, or she looked as if she would
burst into tears. She was as changed as she could be, all through this
Bosinney. As for telling him about anything, not a bit of it!

And he would sit for long spells brooding, his paper unread before him,
a cigar extinct between his lips. She had been such a companion to him
ever since she was three years old! And he loved her so!

Forces regardless of family or class or custom were beating down his
guard; impending events over which he had no control threw their shadows
on his head. The irritation of one accustomed to have his way was roused
against he knew not what.

Chafing at the slowness of his cab, he reached the Zoo door; but, with
his sunny instinct for seizing the good of each moment, he forgot his
vexation as he walked towards the tryst.

From the stone t