houghts of her and of their love to
Karen herself was like passing from dreams of poignant, starry ecstasy
to a clear, white dawn, with dew on the grass and a lark rising and the
waking sweetness of a world at once poetical and practical about one.
She strengthened and stilled his passion for her. And she seemed unaware
of passion.

They arrived at the great, hive-like mansion and in the lift, which took
them almost to the top, Karen, standing near him, again put her hand in
his and smiled at him. She was not feeling his tremor, but she was
limpidly happy and as conscious as he of an epoch-making moment.

Barker opened the door to them, murmuring a decorous welcome and they
went down the passage towards the drawing-room. They must at once
inaugurate their home-coming, Gregory said, by going out on the balcony
and looking at the view together.

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Barker, who followed after them, "but I
hope you and Mrs. Jardine will think it best what I've done with the
large case, sir, that has come. I didn't know where you'd like it put,
and it was a job getting it in anywhere. There wasn't room to leave it
standing here."

"Tante's present!" Karen exclaimed. "Oh, where is it?"

"I had it put in the drawing-room, Ma'am," said Barker. "It made a hole
in the wall and knocked down two prints, sir; I'm very sorry, but there
was no handling it conveniently."

They turned down the next passage; the drawing-room was at the end.
Gregory threw open the door and he and Karen paused upon the threshold.
Standing in the middle of the room, high and dark against the
half-obliterated windows, was a huge packing-case, an incredibly huge
packing-case. At a first glance it had blotted out the room. The
furniture, huddled in the corners, seemed to have drawn back from the
apparition, scared and startled, and Gregory, in confronting it, felt an
actual twinge of fear. The vast, unexpected form loomed to his
imagination, for a moment, like a tidal-wave rising terrifically in
familiar surroundings and poised in menace above him and his wife. He
controlled an exclamation of dismay, and the ominous simile receded
before a familiar indignation; that, too, he controlled; he could not
say: "How stupid!"

"Is it a piano?" Karen, after their long pause, asked in a hushed,
tentative voice.

"It's too high for a piano, darling," said Gregory, who had her arm in
his--"and I have my little upright, you see. I can't imagine."

"S