ht to be done?"

Aunt Hester again rustled the sheet, her voice was heard faintly
pleading: "Done? How should I know?"

Aunt Juley turned away satisfied, and closing the door with extra
gentleness so as not to disturb dear Hester, let it slip through her
fingers and fall to with a 'crack.'

Back in her own room, she stood at the window gazing at the moon over the
trees in the Park, through a chink in the muslin curtains, close drawn
lest anyone should see. And there, with her face all round and pouting
in its pink cap, and her eyes wet, she thought of 'dear Jolyon,' so old
and so lonely, and how she could be of some use to him; and how he would
come to love her, as she had never been loved since--since poor Septimus
went away.

CHAPTER VIII

DANCE AT ROGER'S

Roger's house in Prince's Gardens was brilliantly alight. Large numbers
of wax candles had been collected and placed in cut-glass chandeliers,
and the parquet floor of the long, double drawing-room reflected these
constellations. An appearance of real spaciousness had been secured by
moving out all the furniture on to the upper landings, and enclosing the
room with those strange appendages of civilization known as 'rout' seats.
In a remote corner, embowered in palms, was a cottage piano, with a copy
of the 'Kensington Coil' open on the music-stand.

Roger had objected to a band. He didn't see in the least what they
wanted with a band; he wouldn't go to the expense, and there was an end
of it. Francie (her mother, whom Roger had long since reduced to chronic
dyspepsia, went to bed on such occasions), had been obliged to content
herself with supplementing the piano by a young man who played the
cornet, and she so arranged with palms that anyone who did not look into
the heart of things might imagine there were several musicians secreted
there. She made up her mind to tell them to play loud--there was a lot
of music in a cornet, if the man would only put his soul into it.

In the more cultivated American tongue, she was 'through' at
last--through that tortuous labyrinth of make-shifts, which must be
traversed before fashionable display can be combined with the sound
economy of a Forsyte. Thin but brilliant, in her maize-coloured frock
with much tulle about the shoulders, she went from place to place,
fitting on her gloves, and casting her eye over it all.

To the hired butler (for Roger only kept maids) she spoke about the wine.
Did he quite u