ronic gloom;
this would have been sheer bad manners. I might have attributed my lack
of spontaneous gaiety to toothache or stomach-ache; this would have
aroused sisterly and matronly sympathies, and I should have had the
devil's own job to escape from the house unpoisoned by the nostrums that
lurk in the medicine chest of every well-conducted family. Agatha, I
knew, had a peculiarly Borgiaesque equipment. Lastly, there was the
worldly device, which I adopted, of dissimulating the furnace of my
affliction beneath a smiling exterior. Agatha, therefore, found me
an entertaining guest and drove me to the Palace Theatre in high good
humour.

There, however, I could resign my role of entertainer in favour of the
professionals on the stage. I sat back in my corner of the box and gave
myself up to my harassing concerns. Young ladies warbled, comic acrobats
squirted siphons at each other and kicked each other in the stomach,
jugglers threw plates and brass balls with dizzying skill, the famous
dancers gyrated pyrotechnically, the house applauded with delight,
Agatha laughed and chuckled and clapped her hands and I remained silent,
unnoticed and unnoticing in my reflective corner, longing for the
foolery to end. Where was Lola? Why had she forsaken me? What remedy, in
the fiend's name, was there for this heart torture within me? The most
excruciating agonies of the little pain inside were child's play to
this. I bit my lips so as not to groan aloud and contorted my features
into the semblance of a smile.

During a momentary interval there came a knock at the box door. I said,
"Come in!" The door opened, and there, to my utter amazement, stood
Dale Kynnersley--Dale, sleek, alert, smiling, attired in the very latest
nicety of evening dress affected by contemporary youth--Dale such as I
knew and loved but six months ago.

He came forward to Agatha, who was little less astounded than myself.

"How d'ye do, Lady Durrell? I'm in the stalls with Harry Essendale. I
tried to catch your eye, but couldn't. So I thought I'd come up." He
turned to me with frank outstretched hand, "How do, Simon?"

I grasped his hand and murmured something unintelligible. The thing
was so extraordinary, so unexpected that my wits went wandering. Dale
carried off the situation lightly. It was he who was the man of the
world, and I the unresourceful stumbler.

"He's looking ripping, isn't he, Lady Durrell? I met old Oldfield the
other day, and he was ravi